Project: Family
by DemiSpy
Summary: "Your assignment consists of being 'married' to your partner and 'adopting' a child from the orphanage for a week, making it the best week of his or her life." Mr. Henderson said. "Partners... Max with Fang." AU/AH Dunno why it's T. Complete. Edit Complete.
1. My Life Stinks

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

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><p>Chapter 1<p>

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><p>You know, at the time I swore up and down, to hell and back, that I'd drop out of Home Eco. the following year, nevermind how much of an easy A it was.<p>

You don't get what I mean? Yeah, you probably don't. Let's make a deal, shall we? I'm going to introduce you to myself first, because you really need a head start on me to know what type of lunatic you're dealing with, and _then _I'll explain why I was oh-so keen on dropping out of my easiest class.

Before I say anything, there's one thing you absolutely _need _to know about me. It's of vital importance, for it is the single trait that has defined my character as absolutely _Max _ever since I was born.

Be prepared. This is big.

I… am _not _a morning person. In consequence, I despise my alarm clock. But I have it, and don't—usually—inflict damage on it. We have a bit of a love-hate relationship.

Now that you know that, onto the other stuff. My name's Max, short for Maximum. If you ever call me that… you will wake up in Timbuktu missing a few limbs. So we're sticking with Max, or if you're a teacher, Ms. Martinez.

I live with my sister, Ella, and my mom, Valencia. And now, the newest addition to the family… ladies and gentlemen, please do not welcome Jeb.

Jeb is my dad, literally. He's my biological dad, same as Ella's. He left us when Ella was born—I was around two years old at the time. It's ridiculous. One day he was there, then Ella was born, and _whoosh_! Bibbidy-freakin'-babbidy-effin'-boo. He's gone.

The ass; didn't even sign a divorce.

Anyhow, he came back about three months ago. Just like that. He showed up at our doorstep, right there in the middle of the hall of the apartment complex in downtown Mexico City… ka-boom. Welcome back.

_Not._

Fourteen years later, he decides to come back. He gave my mom some real sappy speech and who-knows-what-else. Same went for me and Ella.

Let's get this straight. I didn't buy _one word _of what he said.

Mom and Ella, on the other hand, grew to like him again. In my opinion, they did it a bit _too_ easily. He started being really nice to us, and he helped us with our economic situation too.

I considered that as _buying _us back. And I didn't like it one bit.

See, when Jeb left us, Mom took us to live with her parents in Mexico. Grandma and Grandpa Martinez to the rescue, and all that jazz. My grandparents took care of Ella and I; Mom got a full time job. We managed, but we did rely a bit too much on my grandparents.

I knew my mom didn't take Jeb back just because of the money thing. He really must've done something to convince her. My mom is a smart person. Best mom there ever was.

However, that didn't put Jeb back into my good graces. At all.

Anyhow. The point is Jeb took a few weeks to convince Mom to take him back. I never knew how he did it, and I came to the conclusion that I simply didn't want to know. My mom's business was her business. End of story.

He took us to live back in the States, Arizona to be precise. He oh-so-kindly accommodated us in this really, really big house of his, and then sent Ella and me to this really big, really rich school.

In a sense, that was the only reason I somewhat appreciated Jeb coming back. My mom no longer worked her butt off, instead taking up a part-time job as a vet. You know, that profession she had to kick aside because _Jeb _left.

It's a vicious circle, I tell you.

Jeb, of course, knew to keep his distance. He was nice to me, I was terrible to him. The works.

Something else I should've mentioned up there next to my love-hate relationship with the alarm clock is the following: I hold onto grudges like I hold onto my hate for Jeb.

And, seriously, I didn't get it. How could Mom and Ella let go of a grudge you've held for fourteen years? It's not that simple, trust me.

All that long-winded explanation just to say that Jeb was officially back into my life, and he'd promised to never, _ever _leave again. Lovely, right?

Now that we've settled all that, let's zoom into that fateful day in Home Eco.

That morning, I stepped out of my room in the usual Maximum Martinez attire: jeans, T-shirt, converse, ponytail, and zombie-eyes.

Heading down to the kitchen, I passed by Jeb and greeted Ella, in _Spanish_. Oh, how I loved to tease Jeb about my bilingual state. He never knew if I was cussing him out or asking Mom to pass the salt.

…it was usually the former. But _shh_...

Ella was her usual respectful self, greeting me in _English_, like the good girl she is. I just rolled my eyes and proceeded to look for my characteristic cereal bowl.

"Oh, Max?" Ella called from the stairs.

I turned to look at her. "Yeah?" I asked, a spoonful of cereal in my mouth. I think a little milk dripped down my chin in that moment.

Ella scrunched up her nose. "Mom had an emergency at work today—Jeb's driving us."

I groaned, but nodded to signal that I heard her. She trudged up the rest of the way up the stairs, leaving space for Jeb to head down himself.

I glared good morning to him, and he just nodded. No formalities, no pleasantries. The usual.

Dumping my bowl into the sink, I ran back up the stairs to brush my teeth, mentally preparing myself for a car ride that was sure to grate on my nerves for the rest of the day.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

The ride with Jeb wasn't so bad.

Wait, wait. A miracle didn't happen. I didn't suddenly forgive him. Do you have such little faith in me?

No, Jeb just got a phone call from the office as soon as he started the engine. Thank-you, Itex!

As any other good host, _please _let me elaborate on what daddy dearest does for a living. Itex works on genetic engineering, basically trying to find out how to make stronger and healthier plants and stuff, or in the medical area, trying to make _'deformed cells',_ as Ella and I call them, to inject into humans and cure stuff like cancer.

Brilliant explanation, yes?

Once we arrived at school Ella and I got out of the car. Ella waved goodbye to Jeb with a smile; I just continued walking ahead.

Ella caught up with me, bid me a good day as she usually did, and then quickly ran off to the freshmen building at the bottom right corner of the school premises. I headed to the one located upwards diagonally from hers—the junior tower, I called it.

The junior building was two floors taller than the other three. Why? I had absolutely no idea.

Anyway. Let's get this straight. Sapphire Private High School was a mouthful of a name, a _huge _school divided into four big buildings and many smaller sub-buildings, way too much greenery, and way, way too many stuck-up snobs with bottomless-wallet daddies.

Like mine.

Thankfully, not all the snobs were as snobbish as they seemed. One of the lucky few that had full control of their sanity—in a sense—was my dear friend J.J. At the beginning of the school year, we found out we were locker buddies, had first and last period together every single day for some reason, and so the rest is history.

Isn't that such a _touching _story on how we became friends? I know, I know. Brings tears to my eyes every time I think of it.

"Hey," she greeted me when I walked over.

I grunted something unintelligible as a response.

She closed her locker door and looked over at me. "Morning mood again?"

"When is it not?" I flashed her a grin, popping my locker open. "Honestly, that clock is going to make me go mad."

J.J. rolled her eyes. "I won't bother with my usual speech. Just, please. For the sake of humanity: _get rid of it_."

I pulled some books out of my locker, perfectly calm, perfectly aware that I had maybe thirty seconds before the bell rang. "I won't," I answered simply.

J.J. gave me a knowing, slightly teasing smile. "I know."

I shut my locker and gave her a whack on the head, just in time for the bell to ring. "C'mon, you know-it-all, we're late for first period."

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Let's get something straight.

Science and I do not get along well. Heck, we're not even like my alarm clock and I. No, Science and I have a strictly hate-hate relationship.

Jeb was too selfish to give me some of his science-genius genes, in my opinion. He gave them all to Ella, that little suck-up.

In short, I paid zero attention to class, because my attention span seemed to be unhappy with me that day (when was it not, though?), and so relented into my subconscious mind…

I meant daydreaming, mind you. And what wonderful dreams they were… ah, burning the alarm clock… wait, no. Hammering down onto it.

Much more violent.

Now, don't you get too bad an impression of me. I had good grades. Not like Ella—I swear, her report cards seemed to _glow_—but good enough to make sure Jeb didn't have to pay for my grades, like the grand majority of the other students.

I wasn't _that _much of a cheater. Though I'd love to burn Jeb's money…

Ahem. Moving on.

After Science came Chemistry… which, you guessed it: I sucked at. And pretty badly, too. Honestly! Science and Chemistry are like brother and sister! Why can't they be just one class? Like… like… Chemience? Or Scemistry? Really!

…really… it's not such a bad idea…

Blah. After Scemistry, I had _the _class. You ready?

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, female dogs and holes in the butt… I present to you: Home Eco.!

Please don't give a round of applause. That day's class just doesn't deserve it.

Now, let's find out what had me so interested in dropping out when I started telling you all this. Shall we?

I entered the classroom and sat in my usual seat. JJ didn't have this class with me, but my friend Sam did.

Cue Sam entering the room.

He greeted me and sat in _his _usual spot, right beside mine.

Let's get the four-one-one on this class.

Mr. Henderson was in his mid-thirties at the time, and his single-best quality was cracking jokes. His worst… was coming up with assignments. 'Cause, man, those were freaking embarrassing. And terribly, mentally painful. Scarring, even. The horror!

No, seriously. That day's class was just proof of it.

There weren't all that many students in that class, around thirty in total. The overall class was actually split into two groups, each of fifteen. One would think that the easiest class in the junior program would be completely crowded… but no.

After that day, I understood why.

Let's see. I already introduced you to Sam, right? Yeah, he's that doofus that sits next to me. See him? Good.

A little bit after Sam came in, Mr. Henderson walked in, scanning the room, like always. There was only one empty seat, and considering I had yet to hear the swoons, sighs, and giggles (the SSGs, J.J. and I called them), Fang was clearly MIA.

Sure enough, about two minutes after Henderson came in, the door opened once again to reveal Mr. Ride in all his dark and gloomy glory. "Sorry 'bout that. I have a note," he said, handing some paper to Mr. Henderson, and taking his seat.

Three, two, one…

"Hi Fang," I heard about eight girls say, five of which then proceeded to giggle, two of which promptly sighed, and one of them actually came close to tipping her desk while trying to get a sneak peek.

Ah. See? The SSGs. I heard Sam groan next to me, and I chuckled quietly.

"We've seen worse days," I mumbled.

He nodded. "Remember when Catherine Barnes fainted?"

I laughed into the palm of my hand, slapping the desk with my hand. "How could I not? It's a classic!"

"Alright then, settle down class," Mr. Henderson said. He was grinning—considering how he'd been standing so close to where Sam and I were seated, I was pretty sure he'd heard us. "Today, I'm introducing you to a new project the school designed. You may recall how last week I mentioned that the entire junior class would have the same project, counting as your mid-term exam, correct?"

Everyone nodded.

"Well, we decided to move it up a bit, once the project was approved of."

Cue the general groan.

Mr. Henderson waved a hand, and the class eventually quieted down. "So…" he continued, "today my mission is to introduce you to PF."

Sam laughed quietly. He leaned over and said, "He's introducing us to Phineas and Ferb?"

I held in my laugh. "Sam… you watch too much TV with your brother."

"This project will mostly be about responsibility, teamwork, and a pinch of your own creativity, as always." Henderson made a face that warned me of what was to come next: "The project will be done in pairs…"

Cue the typical eight sighs, followed by: _Oh, my gosh! I want work with Fang!_

And then Henderson continued: "…all of which have already been picked out."

Ah, I knew there was I reason he was my favorite teacher.

Once the disappointed sighs, and the general groan cleared up, I looked around the room, absentmindedly wondering who I'd be paired up with.

My gaze met Dylan's, which was staring so intently at me, I could almost see the steam coming out of the top of his head. I glared at him, and turned around.

_Henderson_, _if you want to keep your throne as my favorite, you'd better not pair my with that… that… thing._

Let me elaborate quickly on Dylan before I continue: Dylan had an obsessive infatuation with me—I didn't know why. He gave me the creeps—he seemed to be oblivious to that fact.

I'll admit, at first he'd been really sweet about his whole crush on me. I'd once even considered going out with him. But it didn't take long for his patience to wear out, and so he turned into the creep I'd taken to avoiding at all costs.

Besides, I'd vetoed relationships for the rest of my high school experience. Guys at this age were just… dumb. After the craptastic result of my last relationship, which had never actually made it to 'relationship' status, I'd decided to simply avoid the trouble.

Don't ask.

Now that we have all that down, let's move on to what Henderson was saying at the moment.

"First off, I'd like to explain what the project consists of. It's basis." He leaned on his desk slightly, the way he did when going into full-out teacher-mode. "As I am sure you know, our school carries out a charity project once a year."

Lissa raised her hand, but didn't bother to wait to be called on. "The one with the orphanage?"

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone flinch. I turned to get a better look, curious, but didn't notice anything. Shaking my head to dismiss the thought, I turned back to Henderson.

Mr. Henderson nodded. "Exactly. Every year, this school sends a select group of students to the orphanage, where they play with the kids and take them out on their best day ever. This year, though, we changed it a bit to suit our needs for this project."

He laughed. We must've all had the same confused look. Don't you just hate it when teachers laugh at your expense? It happened to me a lot.

"Essentially, you are going to be 'married' to your partner for a week. You'll adopt one of the kids from the orphanage during said week, and will treat this kid to the best week of his or her life."

I could practically feel everyone's mental wheels turning. Slowly. And then, cue the general chaos. Picture it however you like. It can't be far off from what happened.

"He's joking, right?" I heard Sam mutter.

My only response was slamming my head against the desk.

"Settle down, I'm not done yet," Henderson said. "The school has generously provided this class with fifteen apartments, all of which are scattered around the city. Keeping all of you in one building would be… ah, problematic. You will live there with your partner and adopted child for the week." Henderson paused. "Personally, I like the whole realism of the project. It's very different from what we usually do, here in the classroom."

I didn't think anyone agreed with him on that.

Personally, I thought it was all a bit overboard. Was the school seriously trusting teenagers—_teenagers_—to live on their own, with some random kid, for a week… and they don't expect _any _funny business? Was modern civilization really that naïve?

"Now, before I call out partners, any questions?"

Rebecca Mason raised her hand. "When does the project start?"

Mr. Henderson smiled at her. "Good question. The project officially starts next Monday morning, ending on Sunday night. Still, tomorrow I expect all of you to go with your assigned partner to go to the orphanage and pick out the child you'll be taking care of. You'll have to fill out a few papers, and bring them to me. When you bring over the papers, I will hand over a folder like this one," he said, holding up a folder that looked a bit stuffed up, "which has all the information you'll need, along with keys to your apartment. Any other questions?"

No one else spoke.

I figured they all either wanted to get to the partners part… or they were just about as frozen in shock as I was. Or they were so friggin' angry at Henderson that they couldn't trust their voices.

That last one kind of applied for me, too.

"Good," Mr. Henderson said. "Now, as for your partners… I took great care to pair you up with people you don't know very well, but can get along with—I did my best to avoid inter-student feuds." He gave us a cheeky grin. "For the most part, anyway. Also, remember that some of you have your partner in the other Home Eco. group alright? Meet up with them at lunch period or something to discuss this, the other group already had this class."

Everyone nodded.

Well, everyone except me. I was internally praying I wouldn't be paired up with Dylan. Because if I was… well, it was nice knowing you all. Tell my mother and Ella I love them… tell Jeb it's his fault I died because he enrolled me into that school… bury my alarm clock beside me…

"Alright… partners," he mumbled, looking over a sheet of paper. "Sam…"

The alluded shut his eyes hard, as if waiting for the room to explode.

"With Rebecca."

Sam sighed.

I gave him a grin, and patted him on the shoulder. His crush on Rebecca was no secret—to me, anyway. Besides, like me, I was positive he'd been praying he wouldn't get one of the SSG girls.

I would've put my own death on hold just to attend his funeral, had that tragedy happened.

"Lissa…" Mr. Henderson continued. "With Dylan."

The grin that spread across my face was perhaps a bit exaggerate. I believe I caught about three people staring at me, besides Sam of course, who had been laughing.

Humph. I mentally took back what I'd said about attending his funeral.

"Next are…" As he read the next two names, a slow grin spread across his face. I pitied the two poor souls he was about to announce.

"Max and Fang."

I forbid laughing. You are strictly forbidden to laugh, under orders of the great Maximum Martinez.

…I fell off my seat.

"What?" I sputtered.

To keep the rating PG, kiddos, I'm going to omit the long, rather disturbing string of curses that left my lips after that. _And _I'm going to omit the ones that went through my head, too. Those are a wee bit more dangerous.

After Henderson ordered me to sit back down, and once the SSGs had stopped glaring at me, only to lay their heads on their desks and sob quietly, I warily, cautiously, very slowly turned to look at Fang. He was looking at me… studying me. Of course, those dark eyes of his seemed to be boring holes into my head, trying to read my mind.

I'd always hated that look of his. It was as if he really could see my train of thought—knowing my every secret.

What's worse, he always managed to look at me that way while remaining impassive—I never, not once figured out what he was thinking just by looking at him. It was scientifically proven by the great Maximum Martinez that reading Fang Ride's mind was impossible.

Leaving aside the fact that the great Maximum Martinez sucked at Scemistry, of course.

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><p><strong><strong>Edited: 8.15.2012. Posted: 8.18.2012<strong>**

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><p><strong>AN:<strong>

**Welcome to the story!**

**Whether you're an old reader re-reading the edited version, or a new reader checking it out for the first time, I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I did writing it. Review? :)**

**Also, check out the companion story to this one, Week in Hell, which is this story but in Fang's POV (in the form of blog posts). **

**Happy reading!**

**-DemiSpy.**


	2. Angel

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

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><p>Chapter 2<p>

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><p>I woke up with a headache. And, let me tell you, the annoying bleep of my alarm clock didn't do much to soothe it.<p>

Of course, I might've woken up _without _a headache, if it weren't for my impending doom. You know, that thing Sam confused with Phineas and Ferb. Yeah, that one. Project: Family.

They were my least two favorite words at the moment.

Alright, _project _always had been one of my least favorite words. But that's not the point. So shut up.

Ella hadn't been much help. Once I got home, still groaning and whining, I explained the concept of the project. Mom and Jeb already knew—they'd received an email about it a week earlier.

And they hadn't warned me! Those… those traitors! Alright, I expected it from Jeb, but Mom? How could she?

Anyway. Ella was completely ecstatic, making up for my lack of excitement. She kept going on about how cool it would be and blah, blah, blah… spare me.

She did say one thing that kind of, more or less eased the weight that seemed to have settled on my shoulders. Well, two things. One, the project _did _mean one week off from school. Two, I was good with kids. Back when we lived with Grandma and Grandpa, I used to babysit our neighbors' daughter, Samantha. She was the cutest five year-old I'd ever had the pleasure to meet.

The project, of course, had some major downsides, too. The type of downsides Ella couldn't just overlook. The main one being Fang, naturally. Ella shut up about how awesome the experience would be when I told her who I got.

Ah… silence.

Anyhow, the point is Ella knew Fang. She had a crush on his brother, Iggy, at the time. They were both freshmen, and really good friends. They, along with this girl, Nudge, were absolutely inseparable.

They were the epitome of the whole 'fall for the best friend' cliché, though Nudge's presence kind of made them unique. She could make your ears bleed.

Well, Nudge and Fang. Fang was also kind of a stick in the mud, or whatever proverbial stick you want to use. I don't mind.

Anyway, I drifted off topic. It's the headache talking, sorry about that.

Jeb took me to the orphanage that morning. After class, Fang and I had talked for a total of about five minutes, during which we agreed to meet up at eleven am at the orphanage.

Well, I talked. He just nodded. And nodded. And nodded.

Fang was already there when we arriced. "Here's good," I told Jeb.

He nodded and stopped in front of the entrance. "You sure you don't want your mom or me to pick you up?"

"No, Fang's giving me a ride. Thanks anyways."

He blinked. Hmm… I think that was the first time I said thanks to him. Out loud. Umm… oops?

I got out of the car and walked over to Fang, not bothering to wave goodbye. I figured that made up for my little slip. "Alright," I told Fang, "let's go."

He nodded.

Rolling my eyes, I led him to the entrance. Inside there were only three people: the woman by the counter, and some couple sitting over to my left.

I walked up to the woman by the counter. Fang kept a safe distance from me, which, although I kind of appreciated, I found odd. Ignoring it, though, I rested my elbows on the counter and said, "Hi, I'm from Sapphire Private High School."

The woman nodded, adjusting her glasses and glaring down at my elbows. I didn't bother to retract them, which seemed to annoy her a little. Just a little. "Names?" she asked.

"Maximum Martinez and Fang Ride."

She furrowed her brow, adjusted her glasses once again, and stared at Fang, who was behind me. She stared at him for some time, which I found slightly creepy, but then she shook her head and began to type away on her dinosaur of a computer.

It was one of those oldie models that made you wonder how people survived back in the 1980s.

I turned to look at Fang, as if asking: _What was that?_

He shrugged.

Taking that as an I-don't-know sort of answer, I turned my attention back to the lady. She took another minute, waiting for something to load onto the screen, but at last she nodded and said, "This way."

She guided us up some stairs into a long, narrow hallway with doors lining its sides. "Your teacher specified you can only take kids from ages five through eight. This floor has ages five and six, the next one is seven and eight. Just knock on the doors and ask the kids if you can talk to them for a few minutes, they already know why you're here," she said. "The doors that have a checkmark are where both kids are already taken."

"Both?" I asked.

"Oh, each room has two children inside. So if there's a checkmark, don't bother going inside. If there's no checkmark, maybe one is already taken, maybe both are available."

I nodded. "Thanks. Move it Fang."

I didn't like the way the woman talked about the kids. _One is already taken, or maybe both are available._ She talked about them as if they were merchandise. I shrugged it off for the time being, though, and walked up to the first door. I would need my patience to survive the day. No need to waste it all on her.

I was about to knock, when an idea popped into my head. I turned to Fang, and asked, "Do you have a preference?"

He looked at me confused.

"On age? Or on gender?"

He shook his head no.

Guy of many words, I know, I know. With a sigh, I said: "Alright then. You need to talk alright? The kids will think you're mute."

He crossed his arms. "Who says I'm not?"

"The four words you just spoke. I expect sentences. _Full _sentences. You should take a couple lessons with Nudge. She hangs out at your place with Iggy and Ella a lot, right?"

He just glared in response.

Rolling my eyes, I knocked on the door and opened it up.

Inside were two boys, sitting on the lower bunk together. They looked about six years old; one was a blond and the other a redhead. A big, red ball and a few toy cars were splattered over the floor and, except for the nightstand, small dresser, and of course the bunks, that was it.

I felt bad for these kids. I knew that orphanages didn't have much money to give these kids better things, but it just wasn't fair.

"Hi guys," I said with a small smile. "I'm Max, and this dope is Fang. Can we talk to you for a bit?"

One of them, the redhead, nodded and motioned for me to sit next to him on the bunk.

Fang raised an eyebrow, but I just smirked and went to take a seat next to the redhead. "What's your name?" I asked him.

"Mark," he said. His tone of voice was kind of small, meek.

I nodded, and turned to the blond. "And yours?"

"Kyle."

"Well, Mark and Kyle, it's nice to meet you. Why don't you talk to me a bit about yourselves?"

I didn't get much out of that one. I found out Mark liked to run, and Kyle liked to swim. Mark liked green and Kyle liked blue. They both liked soccer and chocolate. Mark wanted to be a policeman, and Kyle wanted to be a firefighter.

They were both really shy, and I felt bad for them. I wasn't sure what I'd do if a bunch of complete strangers came out of nowhere to interrogate me.

Well, no. I was pretty sure I'd tell them to eff off. But maybe that was just me.

I smiled at them one last time. "Thanks guys, we'll go see your other friends now, okay? It was nice to meet you."

"Bye Max," they both said.

"You're pretty," Kyle suddenly blurted. His cheeks acquired the cutest tinge of red.

"Aw, thanks Kyle," I said, mussing up his hair. "I don't get compliments like that very often."

"Really?" Kyle asked, eyes wide as if shocked. "Why? You're really pretty! Right, Mark?"

Mark nodded excitedly. "Yeah she is! Fang thinks so too! Right, Fang?"

I froze. _Gee, kid, way to make things awkward kid. _

Fang simply nodded and smirked at me. I glared.

"Thanks, guys." I stood up and motioned for Fang to get out. "Bye!"

"Bye, Max!" they both said, with much more enthusiasm.

I stepped out and closed the door. Then I turned to Fang. "Geez, I get them to speak up with the weirdest things."

He just shook his head.

"Back to the silence. Right. Let's go to the next room."

During the next hour, Fang and I repeated the same process with a bunch of kids. Some were as shy as Mark and Kyle, or worse. Others… started yelling and saying they didn't have time for our school projects. That, coming from six year-olds, is creepy.

Some were really nice and bubbly, but I think that was only because they saw the chocolate bar I had in my pocket.

Fang was acting really weird the whole while we were there, always looking to the ground. I saw him muttering to himself a few times. It was almost as if he were afraid of the place or something.

That was kind of creepy, too.

Other than that, while we were there, he got a bit more… trust-ish towards me, you could say, and started speaking in actual sentences. His mood seemed to lighten up a bit, but he was still acting weird.

I was getting a little fed up with all the interviews with the kids, and by the time we reached the end of the hall, I was dreading the next floor. We still had a long way to go.

I knocked on the very last door, and was about to open it when I saw the look on Fang's face. "C'mon," I told him. "This one is on the left; it's a girl room. They aren't going to pull on your hair."

He glared, and I smirked. That was some awesome blackmail. (I'd actually given those kids my chocolate bar as a thank-you. Fang hadn't been too pleased.)

I knocked once again and opened the door.

There was a little girl inside, looking about six years old. Her big blue eyes were very focused on the picture she seemed to be coloring, while her curly, blond hair fell in her face.

Fang and I shared a look. _No roommate?_

"Hi," I said.

She turned to look at me. She pointed to her throat, then made an X with her finger.

"You can't talk?" I asked her.

She looked at me, confused. Then she sighed, and said: "_No hablo tu idioma._"

My eyes widened. Fang just looked confused.

"What'd she say?" Fang asked.

"She said, 'I don't speak your language', in Spanish."

"Oh…" Fang furrowed his brow. "I was close enough."

Right… because he pays _so_ much attention in Spanish class. Or so JJ told me. For obvious reasons, I didn't take that class.

As far as I knew—and the great Maximum Martinez knew quite a lot—Fang was a smart student, straight-As and all. He wasn't even that much of a bad boy as everyone made him out to be; his detention record wasn't _that _large.

It was kind of like mine, actually.

Of course, I was pretty sure his two bad spots were Math and Spanish. He loved History, though, which kind of used to tick me off because I always had a hard time learning dates and stuff…

I shook my head. Not the time to go down memory lane.

…forget I said that. Just—forget it.

"_Hola_," I told her. "_Soy Max_."

Fang gave me a look.

"I said," I told him, "'Hi, I'm Max'."

"Well, you're going to translate the rest of the time then."

I sighed.

The girl looked at me with wide eyes. "_¿Hablas español?"_

I nodded. "_Si."_

I turned to Fang, and pointed at the girl. "You speak Spanish?" Then I pointed to myself. "Yes."

He nodded.

To save you all the headache that ensued in the next ten minutes, here's the summary:

The girl's name was Angel. She spoke Spanish because her mom did, and never taught her English, despite living in the States. She said her mom died about a year ago when her house caught on fire. She was at daycare at the time, and didn't find out until that afternoon when Social Services picked her up.

No one except a few adults at the orphanage understood her. She said she had a roommate who did speak Spanish as well as her, but she was off in an interview right now. _Probably with the couple we saw when we entered_, I thought.

Angel eventually opened up to me a bit. She was really sweet, and she eventually even hugged me. She said I was a nice person.

I found out a few random things about her as well. She liked plush animals, coloring books, swing sets, peaches, and, like any other kid her age, chocolate.

I respected her a lot for that last bit.

Fang and I said goodbye to her, and we stepped back out to the corridor.

I turned to Fang, and said: "I want her."

He gave me a look. "Angel? I can't understand a word she says."

See? Full sentences! He'd improved quite a lot during those few hours.

"Yeah you can," I said. "Bits and pieces. Besides, look at her. She's really, really sweet. And lonely." I bit my lip, unable to believe what I was about to say. "Please?" Before the shock completely registered on his face—I just never liked saying the magic word, okay?—I added, "Unless you want the hair-ripping kids."

Oh, don't look at me like that. I really, really liked Angel! I wasn't physically incapable of saying _please_, alright? Geez!

Fang stared at me for a long time, weighing out his options. "Fine. But you have to translate, and if you get tired of it, you take full charge of her."

I didn't hesitate. "Deal."

I walked back inside Angel's room. She was drawing something in her coloring book.

"_Angel?_" I said. She looked up. "_A Fang y a mí nos gustaría que te quedaras con nosotros esta semana. __¿Estás de acuerdo?_"

I was about to translate for Fang, but a sudden weight on my chest made me go: "Oomph!"

Angel was standing on her bed, clutching me tightly. She let go of me, and nodded excitedly. Then, she tentatively got off her bed and walked over to Fang, who was standing by the doorway. Hesitantly, she wrapped her arms around his leg.

Fang's mouth formed a very small O as he looked down at Angel. Awkwardly, he patted the curls on the top of her head.

I smiled.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

After bumping into Lissa and Dylan at the main entrance, getting our papers from the woman at the counter—whose name tag I finally found: Ms. Keith—, and trying not to laugh at Lissa's pathetic attempts at flirting with Fang, I sat in the shotgun seat of Fang's car.

Yeah. Fang drove, and I got the paperwork. Hurrah.

As soon as we were a good ten feet away from the orphanage, I noticed Fang exhaled a bit _too _loudly. That coming from the guy that just didn't, couldn't, _wouldn't _make noise.

I gave him and odd look, but he didn't bother to dignify that with a response.

"Okay…" I mumbled, shrugging. I opened the folder Ms. Keith had handed to us, plucked out the stack of papers and, with a pen I conveniently found rolling around the floor of Fang's car, I began to fill them out.

The paperwork consisted on listing our 'criteria' of why we picked Angel, and how we planned to take care of her and such. Also, we had to fill out any important things we might've noticed about her, and any notes we wanted to make.

It was all pretty simple, though I knew that Fang wouldn't be able to fill it out as well as I did. Not to brag or anything.

We got to the school, and went straight into Mr. Henderson's classroom. We bumped into Sam and Rebecca, both of whom were just leaving. After saying our hellos and goodbyes, we parted ways.

That sounded kind of dramatic, didn't it? Huh. Interesting.

Fang and I walked into the Home Eco. classroom, where Mr. Henderson was leaning back on his desk, reading over what I supposed were Sam and Rebecca's papers.

"Hey, Mr. H," I said. Fang nodded mutely beside me.

He'd been too quiet ever since we left the orphanage, which kind of disappointed me. I was hoping that he really had made some sort of permanent progress, proceeding to speak about twenty words an hour instead of two… but I was obviously, painfully mistaken.

"Max! Fang!" Henderson greeted us. "Nice to see you two. You have your papers?"

I nodded and handed them over.

"Good, good. Here's your folder," he said, handing over a folder just like the one he showed us yesterday in class, with our names on it. "All the information you need is in there. Read the papers before opening the envelope alright?"

I nodded slowly. "Uh… sure?"

"Good. You can leave now. Have fun this week! I want no funny business!"

I raised my eyebrows. I looked at Fang, then back at Henderson, then back at Fang. I actually snorted. "You have _nothing _to worry about."

Fang looked at me oddly, but eventually nodded.

Henderson just laughed. "Right, right. I'll see you two when you get back, then."

Fang nodded, to which I rolled my eyes. "See you then, Mr. H."

We got out of the classroom, and I started opening the folder, when I got a thought. "Hey, Fang," I said. He turned to look at me. "How do you think he's going to grade us? I mean, it's not like he's going to be watching us the whole while… for all he knows, we could be leaving Angel with a nanny!"

He shrugged. "Dunno."

_Thanks for the words of wisdom._

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

In his car, we took the same routine. He drove, I got papers.

I opened the envelope. Inside was another really, _really_ stuffed envelope, two keys I figured were for the apartment, and two bunches of stapled papers.

I took out the first bunch. It was the smaller one, only two sheets.

It looked like some sort of Excel worksheet, it had a few columns that said:

_Product name. - Price. - User. - Purpose._

Then a bunch of rows down.

On the top, it said: _Expense Report. Project: Family._

"Expense report?" I mumbled.

"What?" Fang asked.

"It's an expense report. I guess they want to keep track of what stuff we buy for Angel or something."

He nodded.

Rolling my eyes, I took out the other bunch.

**Expense Report Guidelines.**

Well, that's what one of the subtitles said.

"Oh," I said. "Right."

"Left here, right?" Fang asked me.

I looked up. "Yeah. Third house to the right."

I read through the guidelines, a slow but steady smirk suddenly gracing my features. "Awesome!"

Fang parked in front of my house, and then turned to look at me with an inquisitive look.

I plucked out the stuffed up envelope, and waved it in his face, grinning. "This thing is freakin' full of cash! We're not allowed to use the money on anything Angel won't approve of, of course, and we have to register all our shopping in the expense report, but the school basically gave us money! For free! I'm getting paid for doing a project!"

He looked at me. "So we're taking Angel shopping."

Was that all he gathered from my rant? I shrugged. At least he spoke. "Basically. Even though I would never step inside a mall without putting up a fight first."

"Or without Angel asking you to."

"Yeah, or that." I said, while eyeing the stuffy envelope. "Do you want to come in, to check the rest of the papers?"

Wait. Rewind. Did I just… invite Fang… into my… house?

"Sure," he answered.

Facepalm.

Cursing myself in my head, I plucked my key out of my pocket, and opened the door to find Ella sprawled out on the couch.

"Hey Ella," I said, closing the door and locking it.

"Hey Max!" she said, without turning away from the TV.

"We're going up to my room to check on some things okay?" I said.

"Sure," she said.

Three… Two… One…

"Wait. We?" She turned and saw Fang. She glared. "Fang," she said in an icy tone.

I laughed. "Lay off, Ella, he's here in peace. I'll call you if… anything happens."

"I feel so loved," Fang mumbled.

"You're not," Ella and I said in unison.

I smirked, and turned to Ella. "See you later." I peeked over her head, checking out TV. "Have fun watching Lost reruns."

She grinned. "Saturday afternoon tradition, my dear."

Laughing, I gestured for Fang to follow me up the stairs. I'm positive Ella glared at him the entire way until we were both out of sight.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

It took Fang and me one hour to read the stupid papers. We were seated at my desk, with all the papers splayed around in complete disorder. For the most part, they were all about what to do, when to do it, what not to do, and blah, blah, blah. In short, the goal of the project was fairly simple: keep Angel happy.

On the last sheet, they finally specified what I wanted to know.

**Grading**

_Grading methods are private and for teacher knowledge only. No, we're not watching you with cameras, though we'd love to do that. The board didn't agree, though, so be thankful. _

It was just like Henderson to do something like that. "I hate Mr. H sometimes."

Fang rolled his eyes and stood up. "I'll pick you up tomorrow at four."

I nodded. "Right."

He stood up and left. The moment the door closed, I slammed my head down onto my desk. That week was _so _not going to be fairly simple.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

The next day was a Sunday. Ella helped me pack my stuff in a suitcase. Jeans, a few T-shirts, two pairs of converse, my mini-laptop and headache pills. I also packed a first aid kit in case there wasn't one at the apartment… I had a feeling I'd end up needing one.

Well, no. Fang would need it.

While we packed the last of my stuff, I said, "Ella, I don't think I can do this."

"It's a grade Max," Ella said. Of course, little miss perfect would say that. "A big one, at that. You can do it." She paused. "You kind of have to."

I rolled my eyes. "One week, Ella. I'm stuck with him for one full week. That's seven days! Twenty-four hours each!"

"Think of it as about fourteen hours every day, not twenty-four. You'll sleep off the other ten, okay?" She sighed. "Look, I get it. I told Mom to call your teacher, but she said that the e-mail the parents got about the project said there weren't any exceptions."

I found it really nice of her to try and tell Mom to get me a partner change, but even I knew that was pointless. "That's Henderson for you. Better prepare—you'll have him in a couple years."

Ella cringed. "No, thank-you. I'm signing up for drama instead of Home Eco."

Oh… I knew that. Smart kid. Letting go of that topic, I plopped down on my bed and closed my eyes. "Life hates me," I groaned.

"I thought Fang was the emo one out of you two," Ella said. I cracked open one eye to sort of glare at her. She laughed. "Whatever, Max. Just… take it easy. It was two months ago, anyways. Long time. You always say you're over it. Prove it."

My sister was probably the only being on this earth that could make me choke on my own words like that. "Whatever," I mumbled.

She smiled. "Good. Now, I am going to make you take some makeup, no matter what you say."

"Yeah, sure." I said.

" And you don't have any say in this so ju-" she stopped and looked over at me. "Wait. What?"

"Just because I'm taking it, doesn't mean I'll use it."

She glared. "Why do I even bother?"

I grinned. "I honestly don't know."

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Fang came over at four sharp, and we headed to the apartment. It wasn't very far, only a ten minute drive from my house. The building was pretty nice, modern and simple. Outside there was a park, with a pond and everything.

I saw something that made me smile. Swings. Angel was going to love this place.

The apartment was on the fourth floor. It was really nice. It had simple furniture, and the walls were painted a light cream color, so it wasn't bright nor depressive.

On entrance, you got the living room to the right, the dining room to the left. It wasn't really a dining room, it was just a simple table with four chairs and a funny looking lamp hanging above it. It was hanging on some sort of twisted poll, and it looked really cool.

In front of the dining room, you got the kitchen. In front of the living room, you got a wide hallway.

The living room consisted of two sofas and one beanbag chair around a small coffee table. In front was a large wide-screen TV with some movies on a shelf to the right. Below the TV was a wide shelf which contained… a Wii! Next to it were a few games and the controllers.

"Cool," Fang said, and walked into the kitchen. He opened the fridge and took out a bottle of water. He opened a few cabinets, and turned back to me. "It's completely stocked."

I nodded. "Good to know. But trust me, I'm not going anywhere near there."

He raised an eyebrow. His eyes then lit in recognition, and his smirk came back. "You don't cook."

I glared. "Ya think?"

He held up his hands in sign of surrender. "Alright, how about this. I cook, every once in a while, takeouts are a must. But you have to take care of the expense report thing."

Well, someone was feeling talkative. "Deal."

The wide hall in front of the living room led to the bedrooms. There were four doors, two on each side of the hall. Three of them were bedrooms, and one was a bathroom. At the end of the hall was a huge window that had a perfect view of the park.

I took the bedroom that had the bathroom inside. Fang didn't really seem to care. He got the room in front of mine, which had the bathroom next to it. Angel's would be the one next to me. I found out there was a door that connected her room with mine. I figured she'd like that.

I unpacked my stuff and then went to inspect the living room, which turned out to be my favorite part.

Ella and I loved to play Wii on weekends, right after she finished her Lost reruns ritual. So, yes. The great Maximum Martinez liked to play Wii. A lot.

We had three games at our disposal. One was Wii Sports Resort, another was Super Mario Bros., and the last one was some My Little Pony game. Probably for Angel's use only.

I shivered at the thought of pink talkative ponies.

Fang came out of his room a minute later.

"That was fast," was all he said as he took his keys and headed to the door.

The drive to my house was silent. I was reading those papers again, just to have something to do. When we arrived, I only said "Bye" and then walked inside, not bothering to look back.

Once I was inside my house, I shut the door and leaned back on it, barely holding in a groan. _Welcome to the Week of Doom, Max_, I thought.

Welcome, indeed.

* * *

><p><strong>Edited: 8.16.2012. <strong>


	3. Ice Cream

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 3<p>

* * *

><p>"<em>Italics in between quotation marks is MaxAngel speaking in Spanish whenever Fang isn't around and Max isn't translating."_

* * *

><p><em>Day 1 – Monday – October 26<em>_th_

It seemed to be that my alarm clock got more annoying with every passing day. Maybe someday it'd annoy me enough to make me get rid of it.

I was praying for that day to come faster. I really, really was.

Besides me, the house was empty. Mom and Jeb were at work, and Ella was at school. It felt kind of strange, I wasn't usually the one staying at home all alone like that.

…I took the opportunity and connected my iPod to my traitorous alarm clock, cranking up my music to the max.

While I pulled my hair up in a ponytail, I heard a loud knock on my bedroom door which pretty much scared the daylights out of me. I fell back onto my nightstand, pushing my alarm clock to the floor while at it, and thus turning off my music as the poor thing came unplugged.

I made quite the ruckus, if I do say so myself.

My door burst open, revealing none other than Fang. I blew my hair out of my face, glaring at him all the way from my spot on the floor.

"Go on," I muttered. "Laugh at my expense."

He just snorted, which kind of disappointed me. I really was looking forward to hearing him emit _some _sort of sound—a laugh was a rarity on its own, and I did want to hear it…

But he didn't laugh, so that's beside the point. "What are you doing here?" I asked, standing up and dusting myself off.

"Picking you up," he said nonchalantly. That was when I saw it: the amused glint in his eye, watching me pull all my hair out of my face.

I glared at him, but there was hardly any malice in it. "Let me rephrase that. How did you get in?"

He shrugged. "The back door was unlocked. I rang the doorbell twice. You didn't answer your cell."

"And you decided to come and see what was taking my lazy bum so long, right?"

He just shrugged.

I rolled my eyes, picked up my discarded hair tie, and began to gather my hair back again. "Go start the engine or something, I'll be right down."

He shrugged again and left.

Once I finally had all my hair out of my face and into a ponytail, I picked up my alarm clock and placed it back on my nightstand. I disconnected my iPod and shoved it into my pocket along with my cell phone. Then, with one last look at my bedroom, I walked out the door and towards what was sure to be the longest week of my life.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

We rode in silence, only accompanied by the sound of music coming out of Fang's stereo. Ironically enough, the song that played during the three-minute car ride was none other than the one I'd been listening when Fang scared the freakin' daylights out of me.

Once we arrived at the orphanage, I got out of the car and walked up to a lady with a clipboard standing by the entrance. Kids crowded the area, clutching backpacks and duffel bags in their hands, running about in the general mayhem.

"Hi," I said. "I'm Max, I'm here to pick up a girl named Angel."

She nodded and wrote something on her clipboard. Then, she turned and yelled over her shoulder. "Angel!"

Well, that's a nice way to call her over.

Angel came running up to us. She had a purple backpack strapped onto her back, which bumped up and down as she ran.

"_Hi Max!"_ she said in that bubbly tone of hers.

I grinned down at her. _"Hi Angel."_

"Sign here, please," clipboard lady said.

I did as she told me to, handed the clipboard back to her, and then took Angel's little hand in mine. "_Let's go_," I told her.

I opened the door to Fang's car for her, and she stepped in, leaving her backpack beside her. I shook my head, and took the backpack from her. Then, I put the backpack in the shotgun seat, and slid in next to Angel.

"Let's go," I told Fang.

"Yes, ma'am," he said.

I rolled my eyes and turned to look at Angel. "_¿Estás emocionada?_" Then I told Fang: "Are you excited?"

Angel nodded excitedly. "_Max, ¿cuántos años tienes?_"

"She asked how old I am," I told Fang.

"_Dos_," Fang said. I could almost feel his smirk.

"Oh, thanks," I mumbled. So now I'm a two-year-old. Fascinating. I turned to Angel, who was giggling._ "Dieciséis. Cumplo diecisiete el domingo."_

I turned to Fang. "Sixteen. I turn seventeen on Sunday."

"Sunday's your birthday?" Fang asked.

"Yeah," I said nonchalantly. I turned back to Angel, who was pointing at Fang. _"Diecisiete,"_ I said, knowing what she was asking.

"I told her you're seventeen," I told Fang.

He nodded.

Again, I rolled my eyes. He was a bit bipolar, don't you think? He talked a lot, then he didn't talk. We'd have to work on that.

I talked to Angel the whole way, meaning I talked to Fang the whole ride as well. I had fun though; Angel and I talked really fast just to annoy Fang, since sometimes he would try and figure out what we were saying. He eventually gave up, though.

No one beats the great Maximum Martinez.

We got to the apartment building, and I saw Angel's eyes widen when she saw the park. I smiled, and told her we'd go later if she wanted to. She nodded excitedly.

We arrived at the apartment, and I showed Angel to her room, and told her how to enter mine through the door connecting them.

I helped her unpack her stuff, it turns out she didn't bring much.

She brought four T-shirts, one tank top, one skirt, one pair of jeans, a knit sweater, a nightgown, two coloring books, a box of old-looking colored pencils, and a stuffed penguin.

I smiled sadly when she introduced me to Poof the Penguin. She said her roommate helped her name him.

She had so few belongings, I felt terrible for her. She didn't seem to care though, and she was calmly putting each of her shirts away in the drawers.

Once we finished putting her stuff away, Angel and I went to the living room. I switched the TV language to Spanish and, laughing in my mind at Sam's dumb joke about the project, I left Angel to watch Phineas and Ferb.

Fang was typing away on his laptop. I sat down beside Angel, and took out my cell phone. I texted Ella and Mom, telling them everything was okay so far and that we were with Angel now.

Ella replied almost immediately.

_See? I told you it wasn't so bad!_

I didn't answer.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

After watching Phineas and Ferb with Angel for a while, we decided we were hungry. I blackmailed Fang into driving us to McDonald's (I stole his car keys), and so we were off.

Angel was particularly happy with our choice restaurant, seeing as she got to go to the play area, _and _I promised her an ice cream for dessert if she ate well.

We sat down to eat, and I smiled when Angel took out her toy. It was a plastic doll with really long fake hair. I saw the sign by the entrance, and recognized it from the movie _'Tangled'_. The movie had been in theaters since about a week ago, and it was turning out a big hit. Angel started twirling the fake hair between her fingers while giggling quietly. I saw a smile tugging at the edge of Fang's lips.

I grinned to myself. Clearly, Fang had a soft spot for Angel. Now, how to use that to my advantage…?

After we ate, Angel forgot all about her ice cream and went straight to the kids' play area. I laughed when I saw her run at the speed of light towards the jungle gym.

Fang and I got ice cream sundaes, and went to watch Angel jumping up and down the slide over, and over, and over again.

I couldn't help it. I started giggling.

I quickly covered my mouth though. Because, really. Me, the great Maximum Martinez… giggling?

I saw Fang staring at me, eyebrows raised. Oh man, this is bad. "I can't believe it," he said. I glared, begging him not to say it. "The great Maximum… giggled! It's the apocalypse!"

He said it. "Shut up Mr. Five-Words-Tops," I said with a glare.

That made him glare right back.

I smirked and turned back to Angel when I felt something cold on my neck. I swear my mouth formed a perfect O when I touched the back of my neck and felt cold creamy goodness… splattered all over my neck.

"FANG!"

A few heads turned, but then they went back to minding their own business.

"That's my name," he said.

Alright, so I knew he was trying hard to make longer sentences, and that my teasing wasn't the best comment ever, but it's not like that gave him the right to splatter me with ice cream!

I glared and flicked a spoonful of chocolate fudge towards his nose.

SCORE!

"Yup, and that's your nose," I said, smirking.

"Oh it's on," he said, preparing to flick a spoonful of vanilla towards me.

I turned just in time… to have my ponytail flick and take the bullet. My hair was officially doused in ice cream. "You idiot!"

He didn't even have time for some witty retort… since I nailed him straight on the mouth. Wait, wait. That's not all. The ice cream slid off his lips, and fell onto his neck… sliding into his shirt.

BONUS!

I doubled over laughing. His glare could've frightened anyone by now… even me… if I weren't so used to it. He flicked more directly towards my face, but I ducked just in time.

Unfortunately… I think I ducked slightly too fast… since I sort of tripped and then slid on some spilt ice cream… And then I crashed straight into Fang's chest, gripping onto his shirt, feeling his hands grab my arms tightly.

I cursed under my breath and made the mistake of looking up.

I found myself staring into Fang's deep dark eyes, him staring right back. His grip on my arms softened, but he didn't let go. I needed to look… away…

Aw, hell.

I literally felt my body stop responding when I started leaning closer towards him. You know what's the worst part? Fang started leaning closer too. In fact, I was so close I could smell the chocolate dripping from his nose, or the vanilla on his lips. I was only an inch away…

When I suddenly got my body back and broke away.

I looked over and saw Angel staring at us, and I felt my cheeks heat up. I cursed at myself inwardly, and shot a half-smile at Angel.

She kept looking at me, and then shrugged and turned back to the ball pit.

I felt Fang's presence next to me… a bit too close to me. I took a casual step to the side, imagining the look on my face. Or… the shade of my face. It felt hot… and sticky.

"I… uh, I… I'm going to go get cleaned up a bit," I managed to choke out, and left without even glancing over at Fang, in fear of whatever emotion his face was showing.

_If_, Mr. Tall, Dark, and _Silent_ was even showing any emotion.

I walked over to the bathroom and threw my almost empty ice cream in a nearby trash can. I walked into the bathroom, and was met with a horrifyingly hysterical sight.

I was dripping vanilla and chocolate like a clown gone wrong.

I laughed at my reflection, then grabbed a paper towel and cleaned up my face and neck. A woman was just coming out of one of the stalls, and she just gave me a disapproving look. I glared as if saying, "_Who are you? My mom?"_

She washed her hands quietly and left me to deal with my hair.

I squeezed out all the ice cream in my hair, until it ended up as a simple sticky and yummy mess. (I actually tasted it. Not half bad.) And it smelled pretty good too… like Fang…

Groaning loudly, I splashed cold water into my face. _I am not going back there. And that's that._

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

We drove back to the building in silence. Angel had a funny look on her face, and when I asked her what was wrong, she simply smiled and shook her head.

I settled for looking out the window the whole ride. Kind of absorbed in my own thoughts, sort of unconsciously daydreaming, I reviewed the day's events. And I was not pleased with myself. At all.

We once passed an area with a bunch of trucks huddled around an empty lot. When I got a better view, I saw some men putting up some booths, and on the other side I saw a huge trailer unloading a bunch of things that looked like… bumper cars.

I smiled. A small carnival or fair, most likely. The area was covered up, probably to avoid public eye just yet. Very few trucks were there by now, and the place was huge and filled up. It'd probably be done by tomorrow night.

I made a mental note to ask Angel if she wanted to go.

Speaking of Angel, at the last moment before we arrived, she asked if we could go to the park for a while. I didn't really feel like going all sticky, but I couldn't say no to Angel.

She ran straight towards the swings. They were a bit high though, so she was having some trouble getting on.

"_Let me help you,_" I told her, picking her up.

I sat her on the swing, and then started pushing her.

She started giggling when she got a bit higher. I figured she could keep on going on her own, so I stopped pushing her and sat on the swing beside her.

She immediately pouted when I stopped pushing her. I laughed and was about to get up to keep pushing her, when Fang walked over and started pushing Angel for me.

I muttered a quick thanks, and started swinging myself, feeling my face heat up again.

Talk about awkward…

I took the moment to scan the park. It was completely empty, just us. I found that a bit strange; it was 5 pm, it should've been full of kids that had just finished their homework.

I kept swinging and then turned and smiled at Angel, who was going at the exact same pace as me.

Of course, I, being me, glanced back at Fang.

He had a tiny grin on his face while pushing Angel, hearing her giggle.

We locked eyes, and I saw his grin fade. His eyes clouded with some emotion I didn't understand.

I looked away, and repeated firmly to myself, _I'm not going back there, no matter what._

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

We got back at the apartment after about an hour at the park. I went straight into the bathroom and took a shower, getting all the sticky ice cream out of my hair. To my disgust, I found a fly trapped in it.

Fang cooped himself up in his room, still typing away. I ignored him, and went off to spend some time with Angel. Later that night, the two of us girls were in her room, just talking.

Well, okay. I was braiding her hair. Don't laugh. I know I don't sound like the type of person (or girl, for that matter,) to know about hair and such without leaving it in a tangled mess… but living with Ella makes some things… stick.

"_Are you having fun with us so far?"_ I asked her while untangling a few stray curls.

She smiled wide. _"Yeah! You guys are really fun! This is going to be the best week ever! And I know Fang doesn't talk much, but his eyes say everything so I basically know what he's saying just by looking at him. Like, today, when he was looking at you, you know when you slipped on the ice cream and he caught you? Yeah, in that moment his eyes were practically screaming and-"_

"_Right Angel, sure." _I said, cutting her off.I did _not_ want to talk about that.

Angel sighed. _"Max, are you mad at him?"_

I shook my head and forced a smile. _"It's nothing, Angel. Goodnight." _I kissed her forehead and tucked her in.

She kept looking at me with suspicious eyes, but eventually shrugged and bid me goodnight.

I walked out of her room and sighed. I should've known something like that was going to happen. Stupid me for listening to Ella, the greatest optimist there ever was.

I changed into my PJs, not really paying attention to what I was doing (which resulted in my putting my shorts on backwards), and climbed into bed. Rolling over, I let sleep take over me.

But not before thinking to myself: _Great first day, Max. Splendid job and all that._

* * *

><p><strong>Edited 8.16.2012 <strong>


	4. Carnival

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 4<p>

* * *

><p><em>Day 2 – Tuesday – October 27<em>_th_

Day number two of living with Fang and Angel dawned with none other than the smell of… pancakes!

I'm not sure if my previous statement made sense. Point is the smell of pancakes woke me up. And so, in my perfectly zombie-like state, I rushed into the shower and got dressed in record time, only thinking about my delicious, soft, syrup-drenched pancakes.

It wasn't until I saw _who_ was responsible of my wonderful pancakes that I got my brain back. Thanks for taking care of it, sleepiness. But I kind of needed it.

As the previous day's events flooded back into my mind, I stared at my pancakes. I avoided looking at the not-so-wonderful person that was creating my very-so-wonderful food.

_Remember that you are annoyed at Fang. Angry, even. He is not a wonderful, beautiful, perfect person because he is cooking pancakes. _

As I continued my internal mantra, both Angel and Fang took to staring at me.

"Max?" Fang called. "Ma-ax…"

I continued to stare at my pancakes.

Fang stepped a little closer to me. "Max… you there?"

"Pancakes," I muttered.

Realization dawned on Fang's face, and he smirked. He gestured to the table, and I caught a glimpse of heaven.

A beautiful, wonderful stack of pancakes, absolutely, completely drenched in maple syrup.

A smile lit up my face, the way little kids look on Christmas morning. I walked towards my seat, slowly sat down, and took my fork and knife.

And then, I dug in.

Fang was chuckling quietly, and Angel was outright laughing. Cackling madly, even. "_Tenías hambre, ¿verdad?_"

I gave her a cheeky grin and continued eating. Well, tried to. Someone cleared their throat behind me.

I turned to look at Fang, who was looking at me expectantly. I sighed. "Right, right. She said: 'You were hungry, huh?' Well, not directly translated, but that's what she meant."

Fang nodded and went back to the kitchen.

As I continued to dig into my pancakes, suddenly aware of the scene I'd made, my neck flushed a bit. Of course, it turned into a full-out blush when a runaway thought crossed my mind: _A man that cooks is the single-sexiest thing I have ever seen_.

I proceeded to stuff my mouth and pretend it was the syrup talking.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

After breakfast, Angel declared that she wanted to know what the 'white box with buttons' was for. So the three of us sat down to play Wii.

Originally, Angel wanted to play the game inside 'the pink box'. But I flat-out refused that, much to Fang's amusement. So we ended up playing Mario Bros.

Personally, I thought the game was okay. It was pretty good entertainment, but I found it sort of repetitive. Ella loved the game, though, and she always chided me for thinking like that. It was amongst our Saturday afternoon classics.

Angel turned out to be a natural. Once we explained what she was supposed to do, and made sure she wasn't holding the controller the other way around, she really got the hang of it. I wanted to call it beginner's luck, but it wasn't. She really was pro.

Besides excelling at the game, she also looked adorable while at it. She had this cute look on her face: completely immersed in what she was doing, she bit her lower lip while gripping the controller as if her life depended on it.

Fang was pretty good himself, though it didn't look like he was trying. He was plopped down on the beanbag chair, relaxing. As if pressing the buttons came as an afterthought.

As for me? Well, I played all the time at home. I was just used to the game.

The danger of playing Mario Bros. for a long period of time is the following: you develop an obsession. Which was exactly what Angel got.

I dropped out a while later, settling for just watching Fang and Angel battle away in some of the minigames. I was in charge of keeping score.

They were pretty much obsessed with it—and yes, I included Fang in there. Their scores were close—Fang was winning by a couple points. It was kind of late, though, _and_ mystomach was growling, so I settled for heating fish sticks and popping open a bag of Lay's.

My cooking abilities could go that far. Maybe.

I, being the wonderful person I was, also served some food for Angel and Fang. Then I took my place beside them once more, and so the Wii marathon continued.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Don't ask who won the Wii marathon. I purposely 'went to the bathroom' during the final round, so as to avoid the possible explosion. The living room atmosphere was tense, I tell you.

Fang looked pretty smug. _If_ he actually had won, I was pretty sure Angel let him win. But don't tell him I said that.

After the Wii marathon ended, Fang retreated to his room, where his precious computer awaited him. I settled with Angel on her bed, just talking.

Yeah, yeah. I was braiding her hair, too. I'm a girl! With Ella for a sister! Quit the finger-pointing.

Angel eventually asked me if we could do something, seeing as we still had a few hours of daylight left. She said, and I quote: "Something fun."

In Spanish, obviously.

I spent a few minutes wondering where we could take her. Seeing as we'd already used the park, our main asset, I was having a hard time cracking my head open and peeking around for an idea. That was when I had a total light bulb moment.

"_Angel, do you like carnivals?"_

She shrugged. _"I've never been to one."_

My smile melted into a frown. A kid that had never, ever, in her precious six years of life, been to a carnival. For the Max Standards… that's just sad.

"_Well, that's going to have to change," _I said while using a hair clip to hold her hair.

I admired my work. The braid looked quite nice. Not Ella-good, but she might've approved of it.

"_Wait here, okay?"_

She nodded and I headed over to Fang's room. I was about to knock… when I realized what I was doing, and stopped in my tracks.

_C'mon Max, don't be such a baby._

The great Maximum Martinez is _not _a baby. Never was, and never will be. Muttering to myself, I knocked on the door and opened it up. What do you think Fang was doing? That's right, typing. Musing to myself, I wondered what on earth he spent so much time on. Was he writing a novel or something?

"Hey," I said. "Angel wants to go someplace fun, as she put it. I saw some carnival being put up yesterday while in the car; think it's done by now?"

He thought for a second. "Probably, I saw it too. Do you think she'll like it?"

I shrugged. "She's never been to one before."

His mouth formed a small O. "Alright, do you want to go now?"

"Let's go check if it's open by now," I said, "and then we figure out if we stay or go back later."

He nodded. "I'll be at the door in a second."

I nodded and stepped out, closing the door behind me. And then… I exhaled.

_What's wrong with me?_

I shook off the thought, not wanting to get a repeat of the morning's Syrup Syndrome, and went to find Angel.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

We arrived in front of the lot. There weren't any more trucks there, but there were still a bunch of people putting up decorations and such.

A man was walking out in that moment, so I told Fang to wait a minute, and go out of the car.

"Excuse me, sir," I said as I walked up to him. "Do you know when this will be open?"

He nodded. "By seven pm it'll be open to the public, and it should be closing somewhere around two am. The rest of the week it'll be open from five pm to midnight."

I nodded. "Thanks!"

I walked back to the car. I checked the hour, it was five pm.

"It opens until seven," I told Fang. "Let's find something to do in the meantime."

He nodded. "Like what?"

I explained to Angel how it'd be open in a couple hours, and asked her what she wanted to do while we waited.

He face lightened up and she blurted out the word I wasn't very happy to hear. "Wii!"

I groaned while Fang chuckled and drove back to the apartment.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Ten minutes later, I was the one chuckling—no, scratch that. I was the one _laughing like there's no tomorrow, _and Fang was the one groaning.

Angel wanted to play Wii, yes. But, this time, she wanted to try _the game in the pink box._ And that's not even the best part. She wanted to play the My Little Pony game… wait for it… with Fang.

She said she wanted me to play too, but Fang was a complete _must_, since he was the one that'd played with her earlier, and she knew he was _good at pressing the buttons._

So yeah… my sides hurt from laughing. "C'mon Fang! Lighten up!" I said, smirking at him. "You should totally use the heart-shaped tattoo!"

Right then, he and Angel were personalizing their own pony. Much to Fang's displeasure, you could only choose from colors like cotton candy pink and sugary white.

Fang ended up using the basic pony, the one they gave you at first to personalize.

So he was using a white pony with a pink mane and bright purple eyes. It had some sort of lollipop shaped tattoo on its butt… and it looked kind of creepy.

Angel, on the other hand, took her sweet time personalizing her pony until she ended up with some sort of pink and sparkly specimen, covered in tattoos of hearts and lollipops and all those things… to a point when you could barely see it's 'cotton candy pink' skin.

Let me tell you, I was about to barf.

I didn't know how it was possible for Fang to have agreed to this. However, I did consider myself warned: _Beware the Bambi eyes_.

I watched Fang and Angel play as they treasure-hunted for the missing heart-shaped box of chocolates. Yes, people, you read correctly.

"Hey Max," Fang said suddenly. "Remind me why _you_ aren't playing?"

"Because," I said simply. "I don't know how all those buttons work." Lie of the century. But, heck, who cares? I certainly didn't.

He glared and mumbled something I didn't understand.

I let it pass and laughed softly, turning my gaze back to the TV.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

By the time seven pm rolled by, the three of us stood in front of the carnival entrance, taking a moment to admire the view.

Several tents lined the area, along with bunch of kiosks, games, and rides splattered around. Plus, the all-time famous Ferris wheel, sticking out the top of the place. Then came 'The Tower' as Ella and I always called it; you know, that huge tower that took you real high up… and then just dropped you.

And of course, one of my personal favorite parts, food stands all around. I could've sworn I saw the same guy selling cotton candy three times in different places.

Ah, it'd been a while since I'd last gone to one of those things. I voiced my thoughts to Fang, to which… you guess.

He just nodded.

I'd spent all day trying to get rid of that awkward aura that seemed to follow us around, and I _had _succeeded up to some point… but even I was pulling away, which I found ridiculous, cowardly, and overall stupid.

_Not_ the definition of the great Maximum Martinez.

My internal debate was interrupted by a tug on my shirt. "_Max, ¿podemos ir allá?_"

I turned to look at whatever Angel was pointing at. Hit the Target. I nodded, and turned to Fang. "She asked if we can go to Hit the Target."

Fang nodded.

Rolling my eyes, I made a split-second decision. I told Angel to wait for us in line, that we'd be right there, and once she was gone, I turned to Fang.

He raised an eyebrow at me.

"She's a smart girl," I said. "And I won't take more than a minute. I doubt you'll interrupt me, anyway." I said that last part with some sort of a grumble. "Listen. I know things are a bit… strange, I guess, between us. And on a normal basis, I guess that's fine. But right now, I want Angel to have fun—heck, _I _want to have fun—, so can we please just… I don't know, sign some sort of truce? Just for this week?"

He was about to nod, but I placed a hand atop his head and said, "That involves speaking. Several times a day." I bit my lip. Here went a repeat of the day at the orphanage… "Please?"

He stared down at me with a mocking half smile, eyebrows raised. I slapped him on the arm for that. "Alright," he said, taking hold of my hand and pushing it away. He held my fingers for a fraction of a second more than was needed. "No need to get violent."

I actually beamed up at him. "You keep telling yourself that," I said. Happy with our results, I took him by the arm, dragging him towards the spot where Angel was standing.

Angel was staring at us. It was actually kind of funny, because she had her head tilted all the way back to be able to look up at Fang in his monstrous height. And her gaze kind of just flickered back and forth between us.

And it was kind of making me uncomfortable. "_Do I have something on my face?_" I asked her.

She just giggled, shook her head, and continued to stare.

We finally got our turn. Fang backed out of this one, and when I asked why, he said he liked real guns better. To say I was frozen would be too much of an understatement.

He laughed and said he was joking.

Ah, so I take it you noticed something off in that statement, too, right? Let's rewind—he laughed. As in, _he_—Fang—_laughed_. Dissect those two words into every single meaning they could convey. Subject and verb agreement—Fang and verb disagreement.

As I pondered this _fascinating _thought, Fang had taken to staring at me as if I'd grown two eyes.

I seriously started to wonder if there really was something on my face.

While all of this happened, Angel hit one of the targets, winning herself a _big _lollipop. As in, the size of her face. Or mine.

I took a moment to examine her lollipop, not believing its size. And it was _heavy_! "American candy," I mumbled, "will never cease to surprise me."

Fang shook his head, grinning at my antics.

"C'mon," I said to Angel and Fang (one language at a time though) "I want to go to the bumper cars.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

"Ready to fly out of that thing?" I taunted.

I knew that was sort of impossible, what with seatbelts and such, but I got my point across.

"Only if you are," Fang retorted.

That didn't exactly make sense… did it? "You're on," I said, grinning evilly.

Angel and I had teamed up against Fang in our wonderful blue bumper car. Angel giggled, watching us banter. I grinned down at her, and the moment the bell rang, I stepped down on the pedal…

And so the fight began.

There's something important you should know here. See, bumper cars are kind of tough to control. Usually, they end up going in every direction except the one you want them to.

But I, the great Maximum Martinez, did not suffer from that problem. Unfortunately, though, neither did Fang.

Speaking of whom, where was he? I looked around, trying to spot the only black bumper car in the area. Angel pulled on my sleeve, and pointed behind us.

Uh-oh…

Fang had that smirk of his plastered onto his face as he sped straight towards us. Angel and I shared a look, and in that split-second before our crash, I turned us around to receive the hit on our side.

Just in case.

Tumbling around in our car from the force of the hit, Angel and I laughed.

"Strike one," Fang grinned at me.

Noticing that someone was speeding straight toward us, I winked at Fang and sped away. He looked at me, confused, but then his eyes widened when he received the other guy's impact. "Strike two!" I called out.

After that, we kind of just skirted around each other. Both of us were much more alert, and so far neither of us had taken any hits from the other.

To keep Angel entertained, I bumped into every single person that came in my way, grinning while Angel giggled. It wasn't until one fateful turn when I accidentally bumped straight into Fang, who had been aiming for a hit to our side.

For a moment I kind of just stared at him, as he did me. Time seemed to slow down around me, numbing my senses. It was the strangest sensation, I swear.

That was when the bell rang, and I mumbled to myself as I looked away, "Strike three."

Angel giggled, looking up at me. "_¡Estás fuera!_"

"Yeah," I said, walking at her side towards the exit. Fang caught up to us, just in time to hear me mumble, "I'm out."

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Call me a hypocrite, but for a while after that, I kind of, sort of… avoided Fang.

Sue me.

Whenever I caught him looking down at me (because he _was_ several inches taller than me), his eyes were unreadable, something I was _not _used to. I could still remember a time when I could read every single emotion that passed through…

And we're drifting off topic, so maybe we should just focus on what happened after the bumper cars, okay? Okay.

First off, Angel won a goldfish. You know that game where you throw a teeny tiny ball into a teeny tiny pot? Yeah, that one. Impressed, I complimented her on her aim.

She'd grinned cheekily at me.

The man at the stand gave us a ticket of sorts so that we could pick up our newest family member, Goldie, as Angel had dubbed it, when we decided to leave.

Of course, the sweaty, hairy, _thirty-year-old _carnie couldn't help but leer at me while at it. Like a drunkard.

I cringed, and felt Fang stiffen beside me. I took Angel's hand, and the three of us scrambled out of there.

I did catch a glimpse of Fang's face, though, and I've got to admit—his concern kind of made me smile.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I had yet another one of my internal debates, in which I chided myself for being a coward and… well, you know the drill.

So I tried to shrink the distance between us (both literally and metaphorically speaking), and it eventually worked. Sort of.

I just tried to focus on having a good time—which I did—and eventually my enthusiasm kind of… stuck. It wasn't until we got off this one kiddie ride and got the picture that I patted myself on the back—Fang was grinning.

"I'm _so _keeping this," I said, pocketing the picture. "Great blackmail material."

Fang raised an eyebrow. "You don't look all that great in there, either."

I laughed. In the picture, Angel had her arms up, her hair was flying out behind her, and a huge grin graced her features. Fang was just grinning, looking down at Angel. Me? I was laughing my head off.

"You sure know how to charm a girl," I said, taking Angel's hand and walking away from the booth where I'd bought the picture. "And, anyway, Photoshop was created for a reason."

Fang pondered that. "Point taken."

Angel suddenly tugged on my hand, pointing to some kiosk. "_You want to go there?_" I asked, incredulous.

Angel nodded excitedly.

I turned to Fang. "Angel wants to get her face painted."

Fang chuckled. "Let's go, then."

Something about the grin that spread over Fang's face worried me. Just a little bit.

We walked over to the stand. '_Face Painting!_', the sign read, '_Imagery where EVERYONE sees it!_'

Well, that sounded pathetic.

We were greeted by some girl that looked to be around her early twenties, wearing too little clothing and too much makeup.

"Hi," she said, batting her eyelashes at Fang. "Can I help you?"

"Them," was all Fang said, pushing Angel and me in front of him.

She smiled flirtatiously. "Surely there is something I can do to… decorate, your face a bit."

Gag me. For some reason, this girl made me think of Lissa. In fact, the more I studied her, the more I could see the resemblance…

Fang saw my expression and smirked.

"Oh, no you don't," I said, trying to cover up that awful pink color that was invading my face. "I am _not _getting my face painted."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," he grinned. Much to my chagrin, he leaned over and whispered something to the girl in front of us, and she smiled wide.

I really, really wanted to barf right then.

The girl placed a perfectly manicured hand on my arm, tugging me along with unnatural strength "Come with me."

"Uh… I don't think so," I said, tugging my arm away, not bothering to cover up the rude tone.

"Uh… I think so," she mocked, holding my arm tighter with a vice-like grip.

Glaring one last time at Fang, I relented and was pulled behind a red curtain, where a plush chair and a face-paint littered vanity awaited me.

_Fang, _I thought while the girl studied me with a sneer, _you will die_.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

"You look nice," was his only comment.

Yeah, right. After the girl had finished disfiguring my face, I had taken one look in the mirror… and screamed. Action which promptly got me kicked out.

See, it'd taken me too long to realize that, in fact, she was not using face paint on my face. I should've known, of course, the moment I heard a bag unzip (a makeup bag), but I was kind of slow like that.

"I—freaking—look—like—freaking—_Lissa_!" I spat at him. "Did you miss your fangirls so much, you _had _to make me look like one of them! _You _told the girl to do this to me!"

"Technically," Fang said calmly, ignoring my jab at him, "I told her, and I quote: 'Make sure she's not herself'." He studied me closely. "She interpreted the message quite well, actually."

I figured it was the girl's way of insulting me—making me look like that. Actually, it was a perfect compliment—to think I was Lissa's exact opposite.

Hah. As if I didn't know that already.

"This is _so _not funny," I growled. "You're going to pay."

He quirked an eyebrow. "How, exactly?"

I glared. "As if I'd tell you."

"_¡Max!_"

I whirled around to see Angel skipping out from the kiosk, waving goodbye to one of the girls that worked there—probably the one that had been in charge of her.

I tried not to wince at her appearance. She looked cute, I supposed, but… gosh, _why _pink and sparkly? It was a repeat of the My Little Pony ordeal.

Her entire face was covered in pink and white sparkles, hearts, and wavy, curly designs. The tips of her hair had light purple sparkles adhered to them, and overall she looked just that: sparkly.

"_¿Cómo me veo?_"

I turned to Fang. "She says, 'How do I look?'"

He pursed his lips, looking for an adjective. "Sparkly."

I nodded. Just as I thought. "_Brillante_," I told her. "_Muy, muy brillante_."

Angel beamed up at us. "_Max, estoy cansada_."

"She's tired," I told Fang.

He nodded. "Should we leave?"

I turned to Angel, and asked, "_¿Ya te quieres ir?_"

She shook her head furiously. "_¡No!_"

I laughed and turned to look at Fang. "That should answer your question." I then turned back to Angel, and had a major light bulb moment. "_Fang te puede cargar_."

Angel nodded, grinning. Fang turned to look at me. "What?"

I grinned, watching as Angel stretched her hands up, waiting for Fang to pick her up.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

"Wow, Fang, you're so tall!" I said. Hey, Angel's words—not mine.

"I think you've made your point clear, Max," he said, chuckling.

I was about to retort that it was Angel who kept commenting on that, not me, but Angel interrupted me. "_Max, ¡mira!_" she said, leaning forwards from her spot on Fang's shoulders.

Doing as I was told, I turned to look at whatever Angel was pointing at. I grinned. A man walking on stilts was selling cottony pink and blue goodness. "Wait here," I told Fang. I walked towards the man and purchased two, one pink for Angel one blue for me.

I was about to hand the pink cotton candy over to Angel when Fang interrupted, saying, "Hey, I don't get one, too?"

I feigned surprise. "Oh, Fang, I'm _so sorry_!" I said in a mocking nasal tone. "Let me rush off to get the last pink one for you!"

Fang glared. "Nah, I'm good with this one," he said, ripping a piece off of mine.

I pulled my cotton candy away from his prying fingers, and glared. "Don't you dare lose your grip on Angel."

"Right, because it's obvious she's going to let go of my hair."

I looked up and smiled; his hair was a mess since Angel held on to it. He said it didn't hurt… right… "While she's eating that pink ball of fluff, you bet she will."

"Good point," he said. "But seeing as she's not eating right now, considering you haven't handed over said pink ball of fluff, you can't blame me."

I glared and gave Angel her cotton candy. Fang immediately took a grip on her legs.

I smiled. Thought so.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

After Angel finished her cotton candy, and Fang and I finished mine (I didn't want to share—Angel forced me to, saying that she would but couldn't reach), we rode the Ferris wheel.

Angel was absolutely fascinated—the heights the Ferris wheel reached were quite the upgrade from Fang's shoulders—and I was just happy to see her happy. Which was a bit of a first for me, but hey, Angel's presence had changed us all. And it was only day two.

Take Fang, for example. He was laughing, chuckling, grinning—heck, he was _talking_. Miracle.

Plus, things were starting to shape up between Fang and I, which was a miracle on its own, too. At the moment, we were friends at a carnival, the type of thing I'd always wanted to happen between him and me ever since... things happened.

Even though I knew that I had strange and mixed feelings for my black haired friend, it was nice to spend some time without dealing with said feelings in my head.

Of course, like everything in my life, whatever goes up… must come down. And so my mood dropped considerably after certain… events.

See, he and I were laughing about something when we stopped in front of this one game. At the time, I didn't really see a problem with it.

"_Hey, Max!_" Angel said into my ear—this time, I was the one carrying her around. "_Do you think Fang can hit the big bell thingy?_"

I looked up at the 'big bell thingy'. "_Probably not_," I whispered back.

You know that game, the one where you have to hit some big plate thing with this big hammer thing, and make this big line thing go up to hit this huge bell thing?

Yeah, that's sort of what we were facing at the moment.

"What are you two whispering about?" Fang asked.

I translated for Fang, and he glared. "Wanna bet?"

Had I not been holding onto Angel's legs with my arms, I would've crossed them, Max Martinez style. "Fang, we both know that only people with extremely superior strength can hit the top. You know, people like wrestlers and such?"

He chuckled quietly. "Alright, how high do you think someone like me can hit it?"

I looked back at the thing. It was pretty big… "Quarter way. Where the mark says that you win a goldfish." I then held up a finger for him to wait before he said anything, and I voice the question to Angel.

I felt her shrug. "_I still think he can hit the top, but whatever._"

"Angel has blind faith in you, Fang. You'd do well not to disappoint her."

Fang chuckled, studying the bar. "Halfway."

I looked at him, then back at the bar. "Fang… you may be able to hold Angel on your shoulders, but I think that's as far as you go."

He glared. "Halfway."

I smirked. "You're on. But when I win…" I thought for a minute.

Then I smiled even more wide. "I get to take your picture while you play the My Little Pony game. Without Angel around. And then I post the picture on the internet."

He stiffened, but the simply glared. "Deal. But if I win…"

"Which you won't," I cut in.

"_When_ I win," he said, perfectly confident. He thought for a minute and smirked. "You have to finish what we started yesterday."

I pursed my lips. He did _not _just go there… "So I get to pelt you with ice cream again if you win?" I said, praying he'd get the message.

He didn't. "No," he said simply. He picked up my chin with two fingers, forcing me to look him in the eye. "You have to kiss me."

Strangely enough, I didn't cringe. I took to looking at his nose, not wanting to look into his eyes. "Fang…" I said, not sure what I was trying to say.

Fang backed away. "That's my end of the bet. Deal?"

I looked back at the bar, then back at him. Okay, I can shamfully admit I snuck a peek at his arms. They looked pretty strong to me… "Deal," I blurted.

I wanted to smack my head against something.

He nodded and went off to stand in the line. It wasn't very long, only about three people were before him.

Angel tugged on my hair. "_What were you guys talking about?_"

I bit down on my tongue, not sure how to answer that. "_Stuff_," I said simply. I pulled her down from my shoulder, just in case. "_C'mon, let's go see if Fang makes it or not_."

He made it.

He took his prize from the gaping carnie—a huge, white teddy bear. What was it with carnivals and jumbo sized prizes? At least Goldie wasn't, I don't know, genetically tampered with to be the size of a whale or something.

Angel ran up to Fang, and hugged his leg. I translated for her: "She says that you're awesome. I strongly disagree."

He shook his head. "Of course you do." He took the teddy bear and dropped it into my hands. "I'm afraid big plush things hurt my manliness."

"And you suppose I'm the type to own big plush animals?" I said, looking down at the bear. It was as tall as Angel, and about as wide the carnie that had leered at me earlier that evening.

"Not at all," he said. "By the way…" He leaned in and kissed my cheek. "You lost."

I stood, frozen in my place. My lips were slightly parted—my way of gaping, I figured. I had _not _expected that. I felt as if I were back at the bumper cars—time seemed to slow down, I felt as if my senses had gone hyperaware of everything going on around me.

There was Angel, staring up at us with a curious glint in her eyes. The soft fur of my new teddy bear brushing against the skin of my arms and hands. Fang's warm breath on my face, and his intent gaze looking straight into my eyes.

_You know that's not what I meant to do_, he seemed to be saying.

Yeah, I knew.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

After wandering around the carnival for a little longer, picking up Goldie, and watching the fireworks, Angel fell asleep in Fang's arms. She'd gotten tired of riding on his shoulders, so he'd picked her up bridal style.

She looked adorable—both of them did. She was curled into his chest, and Fang had both of his arms wrapped around her protectively.

I got my much dreaded repeat of the Syrup Syndrome, wondering how it would feel like to be in Fang's arms like that.

I'd shaken the thought away and continued walking.

I didn't get why I was overreacting so badly. It was just one kiss—on my freaking cheek! C'mon, where was that Maximum Martinez attitude?

I rolled my eyes to myself. _Lost somewhere along with my sanity…_

Fang started up the car while I buckled Angel into the backseat. She stirred awake for a moment, but then reclined her head on the window and fell back to sleep. I placed the giant teddy bear beside her, partly because it wouldn't fit up front with me, and partly because I didn't really want to look at it.

I took my spot in the shotgun seat, placing Goldie the goldfish and Angel's jumbo lollipop in my lap. And off we went.

I wondered what Fang was thinking. Was he mad at me? At himself?

I snuck a glance at him. His gaze was intently watching the road, his dark eyes hiding whatever trace of emotion they might possess.

I hated it when he put his walls up like that.

Once we got back to the apartment, Fang unbuckled Angel and took her back in his arms. I took the bear, the lollipop, and Goldie into one arm, holding onto the car keys and apartment keys with my spare hand. After the car beeped shut, I ran towards the building entrance, where Fang was waiting for me.

We went up the elevator in silence. Once we finally entered the apartment, Fang took Angel to her room while I went to find something to clean her face with.

Fang and I bumped into each other in the hall, to which I murmured a hasty 'sorry', and then promptly scurried into Angel's room. I set Goldie onto her nightstand, next to her lollipop.

After I cleaned up her face (and the sparkly ends of her hair), I went into the bathroom to clean myself up. Happy that I now resembled Maximum Martinez and not a class-A slut, I put on PJs, set the teddy bear on the wooden chair by my window, and then crept into my bed.

Exhaustion took over me easily. The last thing I saw before dozing off was the big, white teddy bear, illuminated by the moonlight that filtered through my window.

* * *

><p><strong>Edited: 8.17.2012 <strong>


	5. Understanding

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 5<p>

* * *

><p><em>Day 3 – Wednesday – October 28<em>_th_

I woke up to the feeling of something—_someone_—bouncing on top of me. Let me tell you something: it's not such a great feeling.

Cracking one eye open, I noticed that my window wasn't filtering any light. It was still dark out. Groaning, I looked up at the curly-haired being that had mistaken me for her personal trampoline. "_Angel… what is it?_"

Satisfied that I was awake, Angel rolled off of me, and sat at the edge of my bed. "_I had a nightmare_."

I sat up slowly and gave her a hug. "_Nightmares aren't real, Angel. They're just annoying images and sounds that tend to freak you out at night._"

Angel giggled. See? I'm good at this comforting thing. "_My mom always said that nightmares are signals that you're hungry_," I continued. "_And it's true. For me, anyways. So, c'mon, let's go raid the kitchen_."

She nodded and stood up. I stood up as well, taking her hand in mine. I was about to start walking when I suddenly had a major light bulb moment. "_I've got an idea_," I told her quietly. "_Let's make a bunch of noise and wake Fang up, just to annoy him_."

Angel frowned, shaking her head. "_He took a long time to fall asleep, Max. I went to the bathroom really late, and his lights were still on. He was talking to himself._"

I furrowed my brow. "_What was he saying?_"

She looked at me skeptically.

Oh, right… "_Never mind…_"

We walked out of my room and down the hall in silence, taking care not to wake Fang. For a minute I was tempted to take a peek into his room and just check if he was asleep, though I immediately dismissed the thought, calling myself a creeper.

I sat Angel atop the counter, and then scoured the pantry for food.

I hit the jackpot.

Grinning, I took out the box of chocolate chip cookies, kicking the pantry door shut, and set it beside Angel. "_Dig in_," I told her, taking a cookie out of the box and taking a bite.

She grinned up at me. "_Thanks, Max_."

We ate our cookies in silence. I, personally, took my sweet time to relish in the chocolate chip goodness. Angel, on the other hand, seemed to be thinking rather intently on something.

"_Hey, Max?_" she said quietly. "_Can I ask you something?_"

I nodded, taking another bite out of my cookie.

"_Why are you mad at Fang?_"

I spit out my cookie. Coughing a little bit, I cleared my throat and said, "_I'm not mad at him, Angel_."

She gave me a skeptical look. "_Uh-huh_."

I sighed, wiping my mouth. "_It's… err… complicated._"

She crossed her arms. "_Well, I want to know_."

_Well, maybe I don't want to tell you_, I thought. "_Why?_"

Angel wriggled her hands, looking down at them. "_I like you both a lot_," she mumbled, "_and I don't like seeing you angry at each other_."

My heart clenched. "_Angel…_"

"_I don't know what the problem is between you guys_," she continued. "_And I guess you don't have to tell me—it's personal, I get it. I'm just… I don't know. I'm worried._"

I felt a knot in my throat. "_I_…"

Angel smiled at me. "_You don't have to tell me if you don't want to. Just promise me you'll try your best to fix it._" She jumped off the counter. "_Fang likes you a lot, you know? You should think about that_."

_No_, I mumbled to myself. _He doesn't_. I crouched down to Angel's height. "_Fang and I used to be really good friends. Our siblings were friends—that's how I met him_."

Angel sat down, leaning against the kitchen island. I followed suit, and continued, "_At some point, we had this… incident. I thought it meant something—I thought it was his way of saying he… liked me, as you put it._"

Angel nodded, but I hardly noticed. I was kind of entranced. This was the first time in a long, long time I'd actually thought this through. "_After the incident, though, we became distant. Fang stopped talking to me. I thought he didn't want us to be friends anymore. And then he… he started to hang out with… other people_."

I felt bile rising in my throat at the memory. Swallowing it back down, I took a deep breath and continued. "_I didn't like those… those friends of his. Fang used to say he didn't like them, either. He was lying, I guess. We stopped being friends soon after that. Sometimes I tried to talk to him, but never got the guts to do it. And his brother, my sister's friend, tried, too. Fang ignored him_."

Angel frowned, scrunching up her eyebrows. She stayed quiet, though, and let me continue. "_You're wrong, Angel—he doesn't like me. In fact, I don't think he ever did. He wouldn't have hurt me like that if he did._" I thought about what I'd just said. "_He didn't hurt me physically. He didn't punch me or anything like that. But I felt as if he'd punched my heart._"

I bit my lip. This was _so _not the time for the waterworks. I'd left that phase in the past, and I was _not_ going back there. No, thank-you. "_We spent a long time without speaking. And things were starting to look up for me. But then this project came along… and, well, you know the rest._"

Angel thought for a moment, staring up at me. "_I don't think he meant to hurt you_."

I shook my head. "_I didn't think so, either_." I stood up and held out a hand.

Angel took it, and I hauled her up. I led her back to her room, both of us walking in silence. "_Max_," Angel said suddenly. "_I think he feels bad about it_."

I pursed my lips. Why was Angel on his side? "_I don't want to talk about it anymore, alright?_" I opened the door to her room and beckoned her in.

Angel looked at me with concern, but she finally nodded. I tucked her in, kissed her forehead, and then stepped through the door that connected our rooms. Before I shut the door, though, I heard her mutter, "_It just doesn't make sense_."

I wanted to laugh. It sounded so ironic. "Fang never makes sense."

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I woke up with a heavy heart, as if a sudden weight had settled onto my shoulders.

In truth, I felt kind of bad about my chat with Angel. Maybe I shouldn't have told her. Or maybe I shouldn't have been so evasive.

It'd been a long time since I'd last talked about that. I guess I was just… out of it. I suddenly felt as if I _had_ to do something about the… situation, you could call it. I hadn't felt like that in a long time.

My morning started okay. I woke up the _correct_ hour, showered and got dressed without interruptions, and managed to keep a straight face while doing so. When I left my room to get breakfast, though… well, a rather odd scene awaited my in the dining room.

Angel was seated in her usual place, her usual coloring book in front of her. So far, that part of the image was normal. Abnormal, though, would be Fang clutching a crayon in his hand.

You know, seeing as it usually was Angel holding onto the crayons.

Angel was pointing at the coloring book, then at the crayons, and then back at the picture. Fang was just nodding along and picking up the crayons Angel told him to. It was too weird. Way, way too weird.

I mean, seriously? Since when does Mr. Ten-Words-Tops… _color_?

"_Morning, Max!_" Angel called out, turning around to face me. Fang nodded briefly at me, and then both of them turned to the coloring book.

I continued to stare at them. I think I nodded. "Did you guys eat breakfast already?"

Angel shook her head. "_Fang wanted to take me someplace. He called it _Ay-jop."

I furrowed my brow. "IHOP?"

Fang nodded. "What do you think?"

Well, at least I got a sentence out of him. I grinned. I did love pancakes. Even after the syrup-syndrome incident, I still loved them dearly. "We ate pancakes yesterday," I said. "So, I say it's a pretty good idea."

Fang actually chuckled. "Let's go, then. You slept in."

I looked at the clock on the wall. Err… oops? "Right-oh," I said, gesturing for Angel to stand up. "_Let's go_."

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

IHOP wasn't as packed as I expected it to be. Maybe it was because it was a weekday, but I couldn't know for sure.

We got a booth at the far end of the restaurant. Angel ordered chocolate chip pancakes; I got the classic ones with scrambled eggs. Fang got an omelet.

"Way to ruin the pancake mood," I remarked once our waitress was gone.

The whole while, Angel was sneaking strange looks towards me, which I found a bit odd. I knew she was thinking of last night's conversation, but I didn't understand why she'd look at me like that.

Let me explain. She looked at me, then she wriggled her eyebrows, and then gestured to Fang. Rinse. Repeat.

We managed to hold a conversation (the three of us, that is) for about ten minutes before I gave up on translating. Fang and Angel openly mocked me, in their respective languages.

Fun.

After we left IHOP, Angel said she didn't want to go back to the apartment just yet, so we decided on the movies.

Fang was hesitant. Seeing as Angel couldn't actually see a movie in English, I suggested this one theater my mom found when we moved here. It showed movies in Spanish and Portuguese, and what I loved about the place was that, besides showing normal movies that you found at any theater, you could also go watch the stuff that was hot in Latin America, but not in the rest of the world.

Ella and I frequented that place a lot on Saturdays. It was great.

Anyway. Fang didn't feel all that great about the idea, seeing as he wouldn't get a word of what the movie was saying, but I retorted that he probably wouldn't pay attention anyway. C'mon, think about it. Any movie we watched would be for Angel.

Fang relented after I made my point.

The problem ended up being that, whereas Fang wouldn't necessarily have to pay attention, I would still be stuck listening to whatever movie Angel ended up choosing.

That wouldn't have been such a bad thing, had her movie of choice been something… different.

"_Please, Max? Pretty, pretty please?_"

That was when, officially, I declared the Bambi eyes as my worst enemy. I sighed and turned to the woman at the counter. "_Three for 'Tangled', please_."

Wish me luck.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

That… was… pretty bad.

Honestly, do I seem like the kind of girl that would like to know about some princess that looks like Rapunzel's long lost twin?

My point exactly.

Fang was quite amused, actually; he thought the faces I kept making throughout the movie were _much_ more entertaining than the movie itself.

In the end, we agreed to disagree.

Angel, on the other hand, was _simply delighted_ with the movie. Honestly, her grin throughout the whole thing couldn't get any bigger. She kept on babbling over and over on this and that and that and this.

I let her talk. And talk. And talk. And I sometimes translated for Fang, just to annoy him. He still seemed rather amused, though, so I gave up on that quickly.

We decided to eat at the apartment, seeing as we had breakfast out. Fang didn't seem to mind… I mean, he nodded. That's a good thing, right? Affirmativity and all that.

Yes. I know affirmativity isn't a word. Deal with it.

While Fang fixed something up in the kitchen, Angel and I set the table. Although we were all relatively silent as we worked (so what if I was still kind of peeved at them for mocking my translating abilities?), Angel was happily humming to a tune that sounded familiar…

Oh yeah. It was the one from the movie. You know, the one the old lady used to be young and beautiful again?

And honestly, what's her deal? What's wrong with being old and ugly? I could certainly see a future like that in my horizon, and I wasn't some freak-chick with attitude issues… right?

RIGHT?

Never mind.

While we ate, Angel continued humming. Fang and I were pretty quiet. Personally, I was very concentrated on the wonderful pasta sitting before me, dripping tomato sauce… c'mon, don't say you don't want some.

In my opinion, the day was turning out pretty nicely. Nothing too awkward had happened so far, and other than the looks she'd given me during breakfast, Angel didn't seem too intent on pushing me beyond my limits.

Of course, that thought was actually the one that totally jinxed it.

It all started after we finished eating. I could've sworn I saw Angel eyeing the My Little Pony game and, knowing that Fang would be doing the dishes, I was her clear victim.

So I signed up for dish duty.

Angel didn't seem that upset—she resolved to the play the pink game of doom on her own. Meanwhile, I was stuck drying dishes with Fang.

And this is part when you all wonder who got the worse end of the deal…

Fang and I worked quietly. All the silence was kind of getting to me, so I started to hum to a song just to avoid it. Fang didn't seem to mind—if he did, he certainly didn't vocalize it.

Anyhow, that was when I got a flick of soap on my shirt. Fang turned to me. "Sorry, 'bout that."

He spoke.

Completely astounded, I absentmindedly wondered how many words he'd spoken all day. He'd been unusually quiet—I didn't mind as much, seeing as I really didn't want to talk to him that day—but hearing him speak suddenly sounded… weird.

Having only Angel to talk to wasn't a problem. Well, not that much. After our talk last night, I was a bit wary around her, suddenly aware of how manipulative she could be. And the Bambi eyes were a force to be reckoned with.

Maybe that was why I missed talking to Fang. I just didn't want to talk to Angel. I almost nodded to myself as I thought of that. I was rather proud of my conclusion.

Anyhow, suddenly deciding that I wanted to make Fang talk a little more, I flicked some soap onto him. It worked like a charm, of course. "Hey!" he said. "I said sorry!"

I smirked. "I know."

He rolled his eyes and turned back to his dishes. I was about to roll my eyes and continue drying (rather put down), but then I got a full splash on my right sleeve. "Hey!" I cried out.

Fang just mimicked my earlier smirk.

I glared, holding his gaze. With a quick flick of my hand, I splashed some water onto his shirt. His mouth formed a perfect O. "It's on," he muttered, his gaze never leaving mine.

And so the water fight began.

I can't be sure how long we were there, just soaking each other like a pair of madmen. There came a point when we were both soaked from head to toe, dripping bubbles and smelling quite nicely, laughing like the idiots we were.

As surprised as I was to actually hear Fang laughing, I didn't actually process his making that particular sound until much later.

I had other things to worry about at the moment, like the fact that there was a rather large soap bubble on the floor, right next to my foot… and, yes, ladies and gents… I slipped.

You guys know the drill. I fell, he caught me, and let the awkwardness ensue.

De Ja Vu, much?

Trying not to imagine us smelling of vanilla instead of lemon-scented soap, I stood up (cautiously) and muttered, "Sorry. I'm just… err… I'm going to take a shower."

And then, stepping cautiously, I made my way out of the kitchen and straight into my bedroom.

And, yes. I did feel his gaze (and Angel's, actually) following me the entire way.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I cannot find a way to shamelessly say what I'm about to say, so just deal with it and move on. I took a _long_ shower and a _long_ amount of time to get dressed, postponing the inevitable. I'd heard the other shower running while I got dressed, so I figured Fang had decided he was too soapy for his own good, too.

However, it'd been ten minutes since I last heard the water running, meaning he was out there somewhere. And I really didn't want to face him until I sorted out my thoughts. So I sat on the edge of my bed, and did just that. I thought.

Fang and I weren't really friends. It wasn't a crime to have fun with him, I knew, but it wasn't exactly… err… right, either. There was a reason behind my sworn hatred towards him, week-long truce or not.

Besides. It wasn't fair to Angel if we kept acting this way. There was also a reason behind our week-long truce, right? Angel. Once this was all over, we'd go back to where we were four days ago, and that's that.

And I'd murder Henderson. But that's something for later.

Deciding that would be the best course of action, I stood up from my bed and bravely opened my door, only to find Fang standing outside, fist poised upwards to knock.

We kind of just stared at each other for a minute before I decided to laugh nervously. "That was so weird," I said.

He gave me a sort of half-grin and pointed to the kitchen. "We don't have mops in here, for some reason. I came to tell you I'm going to scout out the building for a janitor's closet or something."

I nodded. "Right. I'll clean up the counter or something, then."

Fang nodded, and once again we just stood there for a minute until he turned around and walked down the hall, past the living room, and out the apartment door.

And then I heard the door click shut, so I turned around and banged my head against the doorframe.

Repeatedly.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

That evening, Angel went to bed early. She said she was still kind of tired out from staying up so late the day of the carnival, plus our little midnight chat.

Fang went to his room to continue typing—I seriously considered asking if he was writing a novel—so I went to my own and decided to work on the expense report. I didn't want to have a load of work on Sunday, and seeing as I had nothing better to do in that moment…

Ah, the joys of homework.

Fang had progressively left a stack of receipts on my nightstand (stack which, to my chagrin, grew a little more every day), so I tackled it and began to file them one by one.

When I reached the bottom of the stack, about an hour later, I realized I hadn't registered any IHOP receipts. Making a mental checklist of everything else we spent today (the movies & snacks), I stood up and walked to Fang's room to ask for the receipts.

He was still typing, as I expected. Even as I opened the door, he was too immersed in whatever he was doing to look up and notice me. I knocked. "Hey."

He looked up. No, he wasn't startled. Darn. "Hey," he said.

"Do you have today's receipts?" I asked. "For the expense report."

Straight to the point, as always. So what if I just really wanted to get out of there?

He nodded, patting around his front pockets, then looking around his room. "I think I left my wallet in the living room," he said, standing up and leaving his laptop on his bed. "Hold on a second."

He walked past me and out the door, leaving me alone in his room… with his oh-so-precious laptop.

Letting my curiosity get the better of me, I quickly stepped over to it and was met with his desktop. Frowning, I suddenly noticed he had an Internet Explorer window open (who uses Explorer nowadays, anyway?), so I clicked on it and was met by a curious sight.

"Nick's blog dot com…?" I murmured to myself. He followed a blog? Did he spend every single waking hour writing comments? _Nick's_ blog—holy crap, was Fang gay or something?

Okay, that was totally out of line. Rolling my eyes, I heard footsteps in the hallway. I minimized the window and went to stand back at where I was, crossing my arms and trying to look bored.

"Here," Fang said, pushing a few receipts into my hands.

I nodded, pocketing them. "Thanks. 'Night."

He nodded, unsurprisingly, so I turned around and walked out of his room. Practically sprinting to my own room, I mentally repeated the website name, wanting to check it out.

Hey. If Fang spent _hours_ on that thing every single day… it had to be important.

There was also the fact that maybe he could've just been checking it—that he didn't actually spend so much time on that _one_ site, but hey. I've never been one to think things through like that.

I closed the door to my bedroom and took out my laptop, pressing the power button as I sat on my bed.

Once I opened the website, my eyes were met with a blog post. As I read through it slowly, my eyes progressively widened and my jaw dropped. Here goes, for those curious peeps out there:

**Welcome to Nick's Blog!**

You are visitor number: Err… still working on it.

Friday, October 30.

New Blog Post: Day 2

Yo.

Whoever commented that I shouldn't have knocked on the girl's door yesterday morning, in case I could "appreciate the view"… I have my mind set on disemboweling you. Slowly. Painfully. So watch it.

Honestly, people. What kind of guy do you think I am? I'm a freakin' teenager!

Oh… wait. Never mind. Just… gah. Forget it.

ANYWAY. Today was an interesting day. And exhausting. So exhausting, in fact, that I should be sleeping right now, not typing. We all know how much I cherish my sleep.

However, today (tonight?) I deem myself an insomniac, and so I am typing up this post at eleven pm.

Huh. It feels as if it were much, much later.

Anyhow. Recounting the day's events…

I woke up early. Too early. Unable to fall back asleep, I took a shower and started working on breakfast. The kid came into the kitchen, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, about ten minutes later. She looked cute, wearing a flowery nightgown.

I shamelessly admit she's turning me into a softie. Deal with it.

After ten minutes of sign language (and a game of Yay or Nay with the food boxes in the pantry), we agreed on pancakes.

She took out a coloring book from her room and settled at the dining table. She was very, very concentrated in what she was doing, biting her lip and scrunching up her eyebrows, so I let her be and turned back to my pancakes.

About twenty minutes later, I heard the shower running, so I set aside a plate of pancakes and drenched them in syrup. I set them on the table and continued working.

Sure enough, about five minutes later, the girl joined us, staring (almost drooling) at my stack of finished pancakes. I just grinned and pointed to the table, where her stack awaited her.

In a sense, it was almost endearing to watch her dig into her plate. Almost.

After that, we sat down to play Mario Bros on our Wii. The kid found an unnatural love for it—and, okay, she's good at it. The girl dropped out of the game a little while later, but the kid and I continued for several hours. It turned into a bit of a competition.

_Of course_, yours truly won. Have you such faith in me?

The girl was kind enough to fix up some fish sticks for us. She didn't burn down the kitchen, which both impressed and relieved me.

After that, the kid wanted to go someplace else, so the girl thought of the carnival. Yesterday, we'd seen some people putting it up.

We went to check if it was open yet, but a guy there told us we had to wait till seven pm. So we went back to the apartment—and guess what? The kid wanted to play Wii. Personally, I was already kind of tired of it, but was forced to play anyway. Dominated by a six-year-old girl. Who would've thought?

The problem this time around was that she didn't want to play Mario Bros. anymore. She wanted to play "the game in the pink box".

I was tortured, I tell you! Tortured! I could almost feel the designers of that wretched, My Little Pony game laughing at me from wherever they were.

I will never fully recover.

Seven pm could've arrived sooner, but the point is it arrived.

At the carnival things between the girl and I went up and down, and up, and down. It's almost like a cycle, in my opinion. Things start to look up… and then something happens that ruins everything.

Just as we arrived, the girl and I made a truce of sorts—which involved my talking more, and us being… err, civil. I think.

We both ended up ditching the truce, of course. But all was well while it lasted.

First off, the kid won a jumbo lollipop at Hit the Target. She has nearly perfect aim. Will her hidden talents ever cease to amaze me?

After that, we went to the bumper cars. The girl partnered up with the kid in a blue bumper car—I was all alone in my black bumper car. So sad, I know. Anyhow, we made it some sort of competition to see who could hit the other more times.

The girl and I are near experts at the bumper cars. We only got two hits each.

What was really weird, though, was the following: we both got our last hit at the same time. She turned around just as I was about to get her, and ta-da! We tied. But that's not the point. After we collided, she kind of just kept on staring at me… as if in a trance. I studied her while she did that—she had this faraway look in her eyes, the type she gets when she's completely lost in thought.

Strangely enough, it didn't creep me out. The look she gave me kind of… I don't know. Lured me towards her gaze, I guess. It's hard to explain. The point is the bell rang in that moment, which seemed to snap her out of it.

It was really, really strange.

After that, things got kind of awkward. I wasn't angry at her, I was just annoyed. She was the one that made truce, and off she went avoiding me! It was kind of hypocritical. I can't stay angry at her for a long time, we all know that, so I didn't.

What did get me kind of pissed, though, was one of the carnies. He handed the kid her prize—her aim had won her a goldfish, which she named Goldie. The girl asked if we could get a ticket of sorts, so we could pick up the fish later. The carnie nodded at her profusely, trying to sneak a peek down her shirt.

I wanted to punch the guy.

The girl, thankfully, noticed this too. So she took the ticket, and we all got out of there before the guy tried anything else.

I'm not sure why I didn't punch him. I really should have. But, okay. The kid had taken hold of my hand—apparently, she found the guy kind of scary—and I wasn't about to let go of her.

Still. I should've punched him.

After that, the girl seemed to make another one of her famous decisions, and so things reverted back to how they were after the truce. Nice. Comfortable.

We had fun. We took the kid onto the Ferris wheel, and then to get her face painted. While we were at it, I convinced one of the girls at the kiosk to do something a bit… different, to the girl. It didn't take much to convince her. She kind of reminded me of the skank.

Basically, the girl came out looking… well, hot. She didn't look like a clown gone wrong, like the skank. Thankfully. She was, however, wearing heavy makeup. It made her look good… I suppose, but she didn't look like herself. I kind of regretted telling the girl at the kiosk to mess with her face.

Still, the look on the girl's face was totally worth it.

The kid then came out, covered in glitter, sparkles, and pink face paint, announcing that she was tired. The girl promptly suggested she get up on my shoulders. Joy.

The kid wasn't heavy or anything but, geez, she could've tugged a little less on my hair. My scalp still hurts a little bit.

The advantage to carrying the kid were the compliments. Even though it was technically the kid who was complimenting me, the girl was the one _translating_ the compliments.

She complimented me on my height a lot.

After that, my luck kind of ran out. We arrived at the 'Hammer Master', I think it was called. It's that game where you slam a hammer down onto the metal plate to make the meter go high up—aiming to hit the bell, of course.

No one ever hits the bell.

In short, the girl thought I could only make it quarter way to the top. I said halfway. The kid voted all the way to the top. (Ah, kid naivety…)

The girl and I settled into a bet. She thought that there was no way whatsoever that I could make it halfway. So, according to her, if I didn't make it halfway to the top, she would snap a picture of me playing the My Little Pony game with the kid, and upload it to the internet.

That'd be a real treat for you guys, wouldn't it?

If I _did_ make it halfway, though, she'd have to pay the price of misjudging me.

Now, I don't know where I got the guts to actually say this. I didn't know it then, and I'm just as clueless now.

My terms: if I hit the halfway mark, she had to kiss me.

I'm staring at the sentence I just typed. I still can't believe I did that.

Actually, I've been berating myself for saying that for the past couple hours. Thanks to my little stunt, things between us are exactly was they were a week ago.

Do you guys think I'm stupid by nature? I'm starting to think I am.

Anyhow. I _did_ hit the halfway mark. (And my arm _still _hurts because of it. The impact with the metal plate echoed through my arm, all the way up to my shoulders.) I won this really big, white teddy bear. Although at first I thought of giving it to the kid, I gave it to the girl for some reason. Smart on my part, I know.

By then, however, I already knew I'd blown it. Big time. So I settled for kissing her cheek, though I'm positive we both knew that was not what I meant. But, you know the saying, you get what you get.

I got a blank look.

After that, we wandered around a little bit. She kept her distance, I didn't press on the matter. I doubt the kid didn't notice anything—she's way too smart for that—but, even if she did, she didn't let it show. We picked up the goldfish, watched the fireworks, and then left because the kid fell asleep.

It was an… eventful day, I guess. Interesting.

Tomorrow will probably be a long day. And the next day, too. And the day after that. And so on until Sunday. Which, by the way, did I mention Sunday is the girl's birthday? Yeah. I forgot.

We'll see how that goes.

Fly on,

-Nick.

TAGS: _the girl; the skank; the sister; the kid; carnival; Home Eco; Project: Family; day two_

*Nick does not use real people's names in his blog posts without express permission from said people. These names may be aliases chosen by said people. Please don't waste your time trying to 'sue' Nick in the comments section. It gets annoying after a while. Thank-you.*

Yes, people. Although I, the great Maximum Martinez, have proven to be a tad daft sometimes, I'm not stupid.

And I knew that I was currently reading Fang's blog. Alias, Nick. Oh, wow.

So he had a blog. In which, judging by the comments, I was pretty well-known. Heck, his blog was pretty well known. 500 comments for one freaking post? A _day-old_ post?!

Wow.

I stared at the screen, suddenly feeling like a creeper. I felt as if I were reading something private, something not for my eyes.

…well, okay. _Clearly_, I wasn't supposed to be reading it. Fang would have a fit if he found out. Bu that's beside the point.

Scrolling down his posts, I noticed he had a lot of them. Scrolling back up, I found the one dated from the day Henderson assigned the project.

Having a small conversation with the little devil and angel on my shoulders, I bit my lip and weighed my options. Then, deciding to go for middle territory, I skimmed through the post.

He'd entitled it _I Receive an Ultimatum—From the Home Eco. Teacher_. Personally, I thought it was rather fitting.

He didn't sound too enthusiastic about the project—according to the comments, though, his fans seemed to think otherwise—but that wasn't what caught my attention. When he talked about his project partner (as in, me), he wrote this one line that stood out a lot to me: _**That**__ girl. You know which one. (If you're new to the blog, and you actually __**don't**__ know which one, please refer to posts from early September.)_

Okay. Theory confirmed. I was rather well-known on his site.

I wasn't weirded out, per se, but I was getting antsy about this whole blog thing. It just didn't feel right to read about this stuff. At all.

I closed the site, vowing to never return, and then turned off my computer, accidentally slamming the lid shut a bit _too _hard.

Sighing, I leaned back into my pillow. A part of me wanted to open my laptop back up and read every single word posted on his blog. I could finally get the answers I wanted. I could know what Mr. Emotionless thought about.

I could finally understand what he thought about me.

I set my laptop on the floor with a groan. Out of sight, out of mind and all that.

Wait for it… wait for it… Nope. It didn't work.

According to the post from last Friday, Fang had blog posts about me. A lot of them. Particularly, he must've had posts about the _incident_. I was dying to read those. But I just… couldn't.

I stood up from my bed, deciding to just sleep on it and decide what to do about his blog later. Confront him? Doubtful. Ignore? I could only wish.

I took my PJs out of my drawer and just stood there, clutching my tank top and pants while leaning down to close the drawer. _Reading it may have its advantages, lots of 'em. But, in the end, the only thing they'll do is drive me nuts._

I shut the drawer a bit too hard and sighed, pulling at my hair. _Just like everything else related to Fang.\_

* * *

><p><strong>Edited: 8.31.2012 <strong>


	6. The Mall

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 6<p>

* * *

><p><em>Day 4 – Thursday – October 29<em>_th_

You know, I thought my day was going pretty well until Angel just _had _to speak up at breakfast.

I mean, seriously. Even my alarm clock hadn't annoyed me that morning (major breakthrough, if I do say so myself). And Fang had been speaking. Not too much, but he'd been speaking.

Angel just _had_ to follow his example and speak up as well. Gah. See, she said she wanted to go someplace nice. Of course, at the moment I figured she was talking about the park or something like that, so I agreed and translated to Fang.

Of course, that was when Angel decided to be a _wee_ bit more specific… and she confessed that she wanted to go to the mall. You know, that place where there's a bunch of shops and a bunch of people and overall bunches of anything and everything.

Again, _gah_.

So there I was. The mall entrance. I was glaring at everything in sight (so what if I was overreacting, even if just a little bit…), while Fang seemed amused. Everything about me seemed to amuse him.

Angel was very, very excited. As we walked along the halls, she grinned and pointed and bounced along. People actually stared at her with "aw…" sorts of faces. GAH!

"_Look, Max!_" Angel said, pointing to one of the mannequins at the shop in front of us. "_That dress is so pretty! You should try it on! Please!_"

I avoided her gaze, not wanting to meet the Bambi eyes. Fang openly snickered. "_Err… thanks, Angel, but no. We can find one for you if you want but… no_."

Fang must've had enough Spanish skills to understand that, because he laughed again.

Angel nodded, hardly put down by my negative. "_Ooh! There! Let's go there!_"

I turned to look at where Angel was pointing, and groaned. "Why me?"

Fang snickered.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

"You'd think it'd be easier to pick out a stuffed bear."

Fang looked thoughtful. "Technically, it's not stuffed yet."

I glared at him, but then turned to Build-A-Bear Workshop's array of _unstuffed _teddy bears and unicorns and frogs and… you get the idea. "I still think it should've take twenty freaking minutes to pick one."

Fang just shook his head. Angel came up to us in that moment, cluctching something white, furry, and—you guessed it—_unstuffed_. "_Look!_" she said.

I took it from her outstretched hand, finding myself face-to-face with a rather limp, white teddy bear. It suspiciously reminded me of the one I had back at the apartment, still seated at the chair beside my bedroom window. "_It's nice, Angel_," I told her, handing it back to her.

She nodded and raced away to the stuffing machine. Once she was gone, I took a deep breath. "I'm doing this for Angel…" I muttered. "I'm doing this for a grade…"

Fang rolled his eyes. "You know, sometimes you're such a drama queen."

I raised my eyebrows. "That's Sam's job. I'm just filling in for him in his absence."

Fang's jaw clenched ever so slightly. I knew he didn't get along with Sam but, seriously? "Sure you are," he said simply.

I rolled my eyes and turned to look at Angel, who was standing next to the lady at the stuffing machine, smiling as if she were in heaven. It kind of made me smile. "I'm going to miss her," I said suddenly. "After the week is over."

Fang nodded slowly. "Don't think about that right now. We still have four days and what's left of today."

I nodded, and grinned at Angel as she began to run up to us, clutching her _stuffed_ bear in her hands. "Then let's make every minute of it count."

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Angel seemed to like the color blue. A lot.

Her bear, which she had named _Celeste_, was dressed in a blue, puffy tutu, with matching blue ballerina flats, and a big, blue bow at the side of one of her ears.

The bear's name was the thing that actually made me laugh. See, in Spanish, celeste actually is a word. It has several meanings, and one of them is _blue_. Well, light blue.

So, yeah. Celeste was dressed in celeste. How's that for kid creativity, eh?

I helped Angel fill out Celeste's adoption certificate while Fang just stood at our side, watching. Once we were done, I took Angel to pay for her bear, during which I had a bit of a catfight with the lady at the register (she freaking thought Angel was mine and freaking Fang's freaking daughter).

I did get kind of angry at her for that. Just saying.

Once we were out of the store, Fang had the nerve to fray on my nerves once again. "As I said, _drama queen_."

I glared at him. "So you're on her side."

He shook his head. "Nah. But you scared her for a simple question. Nosy, yes, but simple. And you scared her pretty bad."

I rolled my eyes. "Shut up. We got a discount out of it, anyway."

Fang laughed. "True."

We continued walking around the mall for a while after that. Angel forced—yes, _forced_—me to buy a skirt. For myself. Never mind the fact that I purposefully bought it Ella's size, not mine. Only Fang noticed, thankfully, and as long as he didn't tell I'd be fine.

After the struggle she went through to get me to buy the skirt, Angel decided she would only get stuff for herself. Thanks to the school's generosity, we bought Angel a few T-shirts, a pair of shoes, and, of course, a skirt.

She also got some new colored pencils and a sharpener. Of course.

Then came the food court. We had yet to see a few other shops, so we decided to just stay at the mall and eat. Angel got Italian food, Fang got Japanese, and I got Chinese.

Interesting assortment, eh?

While he rather unsubtly stared at my plate, Fang said something like "it's not like this is your last meal or anything" to me. He clearly didn't understand the importance of Chinese food, no matter how much I tried to explain it.

And his blatant preference of sushi over fried rice was just scandalous. I didn't know how I would ever forgive him.

For dessert, Angel got some ice cream. Vanilla, covered in fudge.

Both Fang and I stood awkwardly to the sides while Angel's nose and cheeks slowly coated themselves with the cold treat. You can imagine the images crossing our minds at the moment.

Sigh. I would never see ice cream the same way again.

As for Fang and I (did you think I'd pass on dessert? Who do you think I am?), I got a chocolate chip cookie from Starbucks—cue Fang's enquiring eyebrow, and my long-winded explanation on the B3CS (Best Chocolate-Chip-Cookie Search)—and Fang passed.

I was still mad at him for the whole Japanese-over-Chinese fiasco, so I just ignored him. Who could pass on dessert, anyway? Crime of the century, I tell you!

"Party pooper," I muttered at him, ditching the whole 'ignore him' plan. He just rolled his eyes at me.

It was then when we decided that walking aimlessly around the mall wasn't as fun as most people thought. Angel was somewhat tired out, anyway, so we headed for the parking lot. Although I can't call our chat an actually 'chat', I'll say that the three of us had some fun playing charades. You know, that one game where you communicate without actually using words.

Trust me. The whole translating thing can tire a girl out. Even the great Maximum Martinez.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Once we got back to the apartment, I had half a mind to start working on the expense report, considering how much we'd spent that day.

Fine. Quarter a mind. Big deal.

I was about to ignore that quarter a mind idea and just plop down on the living room couch, but then Angel came up to me, asking if I wanted to play the 'horsey game' with her.

Uh-oh. "_Err… It's just that, well, I was going to go work on the expense report_," I told her. Itty bitty white lie. I _was _going to at some point.

"_Oh_," Angel said. She looked kind of downcast, which made my heart clench. "_Okay._"

"_But_," I said, "_I'm sure Fang would love to play with you! You know how he's great with the buttons._"

Angel's eyes lit up. She hastily nodded to me, saying a quick "_you're right!_", and then she ran off in the direction of Fang's room.

I laughed and walked after her, not wanting to miss the look on Fang's face.

Curiously enough, though, Angel and I soon enough noticed that Fang wasn't in his room. Finding that quite odd, I stepped in and called out: "Fang?" as if he were about to pop out from under the bed.

"Yeah?" A voice called behind me.

I let out a rather undignified shriek as I whirled around to face a pair of amused eyes. He was practically breathing into my ears. "Don't—do that!" I squeaked, unconsciously taking a step back.

"What?" he asked simply. "Breathing?"

I glared at him. "You scared me, you freak," I hissed. I was suddenly taken aback. Had I seriously just said that? "Whatever. Look. I'm going to work on the expense report, so you're going to go play My Little Pony with Angel. Got it?"

He glared at me, suddenly looking anything but amused. "No."

I walked past him. "Too bad. That's what you get for scaring me." I walked out the door and into my room, more frustrated at myself that at him. Since when was _he _of all people able to scare me like that? I'd seriously jumped three feet into the air.

Of course, maybe that wasn't the only sense of mine that was off. I'd never even noticed Angel's grin, spreading wider and wider as she stared at us banter away.

I only found out because she started to laugh the moment I shut my bedroom door.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

The expense report thing was starting to tire me out. We'd spent quite a lot, compared to the previous days. Of course, what else had I expected from a trip to the mall?

Once I started seeing numbers floating around my head, I decided that was enough. I'd finish up tomorrow. No matter how annoying the pink death trap was, I decided it was better than seeing numbers menacingly stare at me from the empty space around my head.

I opened up my bedroom door, and the sound of laughter immediately reached me. With a grin, I walked into the living room, but then stopped in my tracks. "I thought you were playing with the Pink Ponies of Doom."

Pausing the game, both Angel and Fang turned to look at me. They looked kind of alarmed—ha! Take that, Fang! That's what you get for scaring me earlier.

Ahem.

"Fate had mercy on me today," Fang answered. He looked me over. "Though, by the looks of it, fate wasn't very kind to you."

I rolled my eyes. I released my hair from its (now completely mussed up) ponytail, combing through it with my fingers. I had the habit of running my hands through my hair when annoyed, okay? "Those numbers will be the death of me," I said simply while taking a seat.

Fang stared at the ends of my hair for a moment longer than he needed to. "Just like your alarm clock? Seriously, I though you would've gotten rid of it by now."

I'd been about to point out that he should give me a moment to translate for Angel, but then I froze. "You remember that?"

Fang stiffened, as if he'd realized what he'd just said. Which he probably did. "I can hear you bicker about it with J.J. from a mile away."

_He remembers the clock_. I forced out a laugh, looking for a way to fill up the silence. "Right. Err… Listen, I'm kind of brain-dead right now, so I'm going to take a nap before dinner, alright?"

Fang looked at me incredulously, then out the window, where the sun was still high in the sky. "You're _that_ tired?"

_That freaking clock…_ "As I said, I'm brain-dead right now. And I don't like malls."

He laughed. "I know."

_Just like you know about the clock? _"Anyway, just send Angel to wake me up or something later."

He nodded and turned back to the TV. "Sure thing. Tell Angel, though. Google Translator annoys me."

_The way that freaking clock's alarm annoys me_. "Sure." I turned to Angel, who was staring at me curiously. "Angel, me voy a dormir un rato, ¿si? Cuando Fang te diga que es la hora de la cena, vas y me despiertas."

Angel shrugged, looking at me quizzically. "Es temprano... ¿En serio tienes sueño?"

I nodded. "En serio. Te veo alrato, ¿de acuerdo?"

She nodded and turned back to the TV, so I stood up from my spot on my beanbag chair, and walked into my room.

Although I didn't technically take a nap right then (why did I make _that_ up of all things?) I did use the time to just sit back and relax. No one disturbed me for an hour straight, and I didn't hear any noise coming from the living room, other than a few rather loud laughs. The walls had to be pretty thick.

After stopping my pointless musing on wall thickness (what the heck?), I turned my train of thought to more pressing matters. Anyone else would've dismissed this issue the moment it came up, but not I. No, I spent the next hour musing on how it was possible he still remembered that clock, and whether he really did pay mind to mine and J.J.'s banters on its annoying-ness.

And, of course, I did stop to consider if he would read too much into the fact that I still had it. And that I still used it. The very thought of it all just mortified me.

_I thought you would've gotten rid of it by now_, he had said. Those were his exact words, and they pretty much mirrored the message J.J. had spent the past two months trying to drill into me. _Just get rid of it already_, she would say. Cue my eye-roll.

Of course, I was smart enough to know that there was a teeny, tiny part of me that would _never_ let me get rid of that Godforsaken clock. And I was pretty sure Fang somehow knew that, too.

Damn him for giving it to me in the first place.

* * *

><p><strong>Edited: 9.8.2012. <strong>


	7. Again

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 7<p>

* * *

><p><em>Day 5 – Friday –October 30<em>_th_

Let's get this out of the way once and for all. I tend to wake up in strange ways. Sometimes I try to hit my alarm clock, fail while at it, and fall off the bed (excellent way to wake up—terrible way to greet my muscles). Other times, Ella yells at me from the bottom of the stairs, saying that she'll eat the last of the cookies if I'm not down in ten minutes (great motivation). Sometimes, the smell of food wakes me up (again, motivation).

A few times, my mother has had the nerve to pull on my feet and drag me to the bathroom, aided by Jeb. That's just painful—to both my body and my ego.

However, that day was one wake-up call I won't ever forget. I heard Fang and Angel talking, but that's not the weird part. Angel's voice was unusually high pitched, and her tone of voice was slightly hushed yet audible. And that's not the weird part either.

See, even though it took me about five minutes to be completely sure, I realized Angel was talking in English. (Yeah. That's the weird part.)

She and Fang were joking around, laughing in hushed tones (probably trying not to wake me up—epic fail on their part, I know).

I cracked open my eyes and listened a little more closely, just to make sure. The scent of freshly made waffles was in the air, sunlight penetrated my eyes and left me blind for a moment and… there it was again. Angel.

You can imagine what happened next. I stood up from my bed, not caring about my hair or the fact that my PJs weren't very appropriate for public eyes… and, yes, I burst into the kitchen looking like a psycho that just made it out of juvie.

Bad description. Moving on…

"Angel?" I blurted. My voice was groggy and my statement didn't carry the emotion it should've for that sole reason, but at any rate, I got my point across just fine.

It was almost Hallmark worthy, actually, how the laughter died down immediately and they both turned to look at me like I'd caught them stealing my chocolate chip cookies. One of Fang's eyebrows quirked after he gave me a quick once-over. I didn't even bother to stick my tongue out at him.

For a moment, a shadow of doubt crossed Angel's face. Then she bit her lip and looked down at the floor, hands wrung together. Had there not been such an eerie silence in the room, I wouldn't have heard her: "Hi, Max."

Well, that erased any doubt. We all stood there, sort of frozen, and a runaway thought crossed my mind (_this is so cliché_) before I decided to stand up straight and speak up: "Well, that's interesting."

I am _not_ a subtle person in the morning. Ever.

Under any other circumstances, Angel probably would've giggled. Fang would've rolled his eyes. Neither moved.

A couple of silent seconds went by before Angel spoke up, in a cracked voice: "You're… you're not… are you mad at me?"

My eyebrows knit so tightly that for a moment I couldn't quite see. "What? No! This is… this is pretty cool." I thought over what I'd said. "Wait, no. Well, yes but… no. Eh?"

This time, Fang did roll his eyes. Angel kept quiet, though, so I stepped in front of her and knelt down to her height. I pulled her chin up with two fingers so that she'd face me, and I said: "Hey, I'm not mad. I'm kind of frazzled, and I'm not really thinking straight, but I'm not mad."

"Of course you're mad, Max," Fang interrupted. "Everyone knows you're a nutjob."

I rolled my eyes up at him. "Ha. Ha. I'm laughing so hard right now."

This time, Angel did giggle. I grinned up at Fang, thanking him silently. He just nodded and gestured down at Angel.

I stood up and took Angel's hand in mine. "Come here," I told her, gesturing to the living room. "I'm not in the mood to be standing up right now."

She nodded and walked beside me, Fang trailing behind us. I felt Angel's palm sweating lightly, and when I snuck a glance at her, she was biting her lip. I frowned. Why was she so worried?

I sat on the couch, and Fang took a seat next to me. Angel settled for one of the beanbag chairs. For a moment I noticed how odd we would've looked to any bystander—two curious teens facing a nervous little kid.

I didn't ponder the thought.

"Angel," I said. My voice wasn't groggy anymore, and my train of thought was starting to clear up. "I'm not mad, really. And Fang isn't, either. Right, Fang?"

He nodded.

Rolling my eyes, I grinned when I saw Angel stifle a giggle. Then she quieted down and continued looking down at her hands in her lap.

"Angel, if you don't mind," I said slowly, "I would like to know why you didn't tell us about… err, this."

Fang snorted. "You're great at this. Seriously, continue."

I raised my eyebrows at him, and then turned back to Angel. Fang wasn't important at the moment. "Now, if you don't want to talk about it then that's fine, but I would like to know _something_."

A few silent moments passed, in which Angel bit her lip, sighed twice, and looked up at me and then back down about five times. And then she spoke: "Only my roommate, Hayley, knew about this. I told Fang yesterday. That's it."

Okay, I told myself, that's progress. "You don't like to speak English, then?" I was grappling for answers, though part of me just wanted Angel to speak up and get this awkward moment over with.

Angel shook her head. "No, I just don't like being talked to."

Better. "Okay," I said, "we're getting somewhere." I paused as an idea suddenly came to me. "Does Fang know about this already?"

Both Angel and Fang shook their heads. Angel said: "I told him I'd rather not talk about it yet."

I pressed on. "And you're okay talking about it now?"

Angel hesitated. "I… yeah. I think I am."

Getting there, getting there… "Why don't you like being talked to, then? You talked just fine with me. And I suppose you get along with your roommate… right?"

Angel nodded. "I don't mind being around you and Fang. You're nice. It's the people at the orphanage—I don't like how they talk to me, so I don't like to talk with them."

That's some way of putting it. I opened my mouth to speak, though I'm not quite sure what I was about to say, and then Angel continued, cutting me off: "They always talked about my mom. They said everything would be okay, that they'd take care of me. And that was nice at first, but now it just annoys me. They tried taking me to a psy—psy—a person that messes with your head. She was pushy, and she tried to get me talking about stuff I didn't want to talk about.

"One day, I made a show out of screaming in Spanish. The people at the orphanage decided that I couldn't speak English—they said I was "unresponsive" or something like that. They left me alone after that, so I'm fine with it. I've just grown used to talking in Spanish or not talking at all."

I took a minute to process all that, and then said: "And you started talking in English again… for Fang?" I looked back and forth between Fang and Angel. "For this doofus?" I gave Fang a once-over, "Wow, you've impressed me."

I turned to Angel. Making a split-second decision in my mind, I said: "I understand, sort of. Thank-you for being honest, Angel. I won't tell anyone at the orphanage about this, if you don't want me to, but maybe it would be good for you to start speaking up again. Just think about it."

I wasn't sure whether I'd said the right thing. Maybe Angel would take it the wrong way?

She just nodded up at me, not really smiling but not really frowning either. "Okay."

A somewhat awkward silence settled in, and then Fang, by some miracle, decided to break it off: "Anyone want breakfast?"

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

My mood drastically improved throughout breakfast. Things were normal for about an hour: Angel laughed, Fang and I managed to hold onto a conversation, and—you won't believe it—I even volunteered to help with the dishes.

That's when everything went downhill, as per usual. I didn't understand how Fang could dare ruin such a wonderful morning—we nearly had a soap bubble fight again before the problems started.

Anyhow, it started with a question. He asked, and I quote: "Why do you avoid me so much?"

My grin melted. I tried to avoid the topic—so bluntly, I can't believe he just disregarded my obvious disinterest in _that_ conversation. "Err… I don't. I don't know what you're talking about!"

Perhaps too bluntly. Shame on me.

Fang just shut the tap and turned to face me. "Yeah, right. Go through that photographic memory of yours, Max. We used to be friends, remember? What happened? What did I do for you to hate me?"

I turned the tap back on, looking away. "I don't hate you." I tried to sound nonchalant. "I don't know where you got that impression."

He shut off the tap, snaking around the sink to look at me—to glare at me. "Stop it, Max." He paused for a moment. "What changed?"

"Nothing," I said sharply. I pushed his hand away and I turned the tap back on. There was a silence, and then I said: "I didn't change."

His expression darkened—I noticed it out of the corner of my eye. I noticed his hand, still floating mid-air near the tap, clench. I notice his eyebrows rising. "You _did_. We both did, I'll give you that much, but you changed first, Max. And it's so freaking stupid, because you won't even tell me what I did wrong, and I'm sick and tired of—"

"YOU STARTED IT!"

Fang turned to look at me. There was a brief moment of silence—a split second where all we could hear was the water running in the background, where all we could see was the other's glare.

"You started it," I said quietly. "You decided I wasn't good enough." He didn't say anything, so I continued: "We both changed, but you started it. I just tagged along."

I was about to walk away, but he took hold of my arm. I slipped out of his grip, but he then took hold of both my arms, turning me around to face him. His expression was blank. "Quit being so damn cryptic, and tell me what the hell I did, what I _started_."

Then he let go of me and walked out of the room, leaving me standing amongst yet another puddle of soapy water, with small red marks on both my arms.

I shut the tap.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I did homework.

It's a motto of sorts for me—_to avoid your current torture, torture yourself with something else. _It's effective. And what better form of torture than homework? Really, you can't go wrong with that stuff.

Angel came to find me in the afternoon; she said lunch was ready. I said I'd eat later.

She came in about an hour later, saying that I really should eat something. I stole a granola bar from the pantry.

She returned one last time, at around 5pm, asking if we could go to the park. I said I was sorry, but that I had a lot of things to do, that we'd go tomorrow.

Not two minutes had passed when Fang came in. "You cannot be serious," he said simply, eyeing the stack of books that surrounded me. I didn't bother looking up. He strode towards my bed, and in one swift movement, he tore the notebook out of my hands, pushed my book aside, and pulled me up by the arm. That hurt.

"You are angry at me, not at Angel. You won't listen to me, but you'll listen to Angel. I expect you to be at the door in one minute, a smile plastered on your face. We're going to the park and you're going to like it, am I clear?"

I gave him a defiant glare as I crossed my arms over my chest. "You're not my father, Fang. And even if you were—news flash—I never listen to Jeb. Don't you dare treat me like a child."

He rolled his eyes. "Then stop acting like one." He started to walk out, but he stopped at the door. "Bring a sweater." Then he walked out, leaving the door wide open behind him.

I clenched my fists and walked out the door, right behind him.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I regretted not taking a sweater.

It wasn't cold, really, I just felt this nagging breeze on my bare arms. The sky didn't look particularly happy—in fact, I'm pretty sure that's why the park was so deserted. Rain would start pouring any second.

In fact, thinking about that, I looked around. There were only three other people there—I could see the silhouette of a couple standing at the far edge of the park, and there was a little girl on the swings.

Angel ran off to the jungle gym, and Fang caught up with me. He stood at my side, and I saw him put his hands in his pockets out of the corner of my eye. "Listen," he said. "I…"

I squinted a little, still looking at the couple at the other side of the park. "Hey," I cut Fang off. He looked at me oddly—oops, I interrupted something important, didn't I?—but then he followed my gaze. "Isn't that…" I trailed off as the woman's head whirled in our direction, her familiar red hair flying around her head.

I squeezed my eyes shut. Damn. _Three, two…_

"FANG!"

I groaned softly, or so I thought, because my groan echoed loud and clear. I cleared my throat, but then I realized the sound _hadn't_ come from me. I turned to Fang, my eyebrows raised. "Talk about subtlety," I mumbled at him.

He rolled his eyes and turned to look at Lissa, who stopped in front of us. Dylan was at her side a moment later, flashing me a grin that could've blinded a country.

Ouch.

"Fang! Oh—my—gosh, isn't it, like, so awesome that we bumped into each other? Like, totally meant to be, yeah?"

Fang nodded in that solemn way of his. "Lissa," I said for him. "Dylan. Err… nice to see you."

Pretty eloquent, for my standards anyway. Lissa gave me a once-over, and then decided I wasn't as interesting as Fang. She flipped her hair at me and turned to face Fang. I sputtered for a moment—let's get this straight: I don't usually get grossed out. But Lissa's hair in my mouth? C'mon! Who knows how many chemicals have touched the stuff... gah. Let us remember I'm more of an all-natural sort of girl.

I heard a couple squeals coming from my right. Convinced it wasn't Dylan making the noise, I turned around to look at Angel, who was laughing with the other kid I'd seen—probably Lissa and Dylan's adoptee.

"They know each other?"

I was talking to myself when I said that, actually, but Dylan answered anyway. "I guess." He turned to face me, and he pointed to a nearby bench. "I think those two will take a while," he gestured to Fang and Lissa.

I rolled my eyes at them, not really wanting to stay close, and walked over to the bench. I sat down next to Dylan and only then did I realize that I wasn't particularly keen on talking to him, either. Oops.

"So…" Dylan said, trailing off for a moment. "How's life with The Silent One?"

I turned to face 'The Silent One', who was stoic as ever, listening to Lissa rant about something or other. "You know…" I said, "Silent. How's life with the Squealer?"

Dylan chuckled. "You know, loud. I am so ready for this week to be over."

I chuckled right back. "I feel ya. I'm going to miss Angel, though," I said, pointing to the spot where Angel and Hayley were going down the slide.

He nodded. "Lissa's pushy with her, though. She wants Hayley to be a miniature her or something. I think Hayley wants the week to end just as much."

"Hayley? I think… yeah, I think she's Angel's roommate," I said after thinking about it for a minute. "I can see her hating Lissa."

"I literally see her hating Lissa. I'm her safe haven or something."

I elbowed Dylan. "Oh, getting cocky, then?" He laughed.

I sat back and relaxed, deciding that Dylan was being nice for a change, even if just for the day. Maybe Hayley had an effect on him, the way Angel did Fang? At any rate, he was being a nice person, and I really, really needed a nice person at the moment.

"What about you?" Dylan asked. "Does The Silent One get along with… sorry, what was it? Angela?"

"Angel," I corrected him. "And they get along just fine—they bonded over their love of Wii, though I wasn't the one to tell you that." I winked, and he chuckled. "Besides, it seems to be that Angel doesn't care that he only says about ten words per day."

Call me harsh, but let's remember that I was considerably angry at The Silent One.

Dylan nodded. "Then she's certainly an angel, excuse the pun. Hayley has an unnaturally large reserve of patience."

I nodded, still watching the girls. "I'm going to miss Angel once this is over. I don't know why but… don't you get this feeling that so many things will be different once this is over?"

Dylan didn't answer, so I turned to give him with a questioning look. He was staring at me. His eyes roamed over my face in a way that made me feel uncomfortable—even more uncomfortable than I would've felt had he been looking at… other parts of me.

He took his sweet time staring at my lips, and even though I wanted to say something, to snap my fingers in his face, I couldn't. I felt sort of frozen. The last time someone had looked at me that way had been… it'd been…

Dylan looked up at my eyes. "I think a lot of things _will_ be different." He got closer and I knew what he was going to do. I didn't know how to react—Dylan was a jerk, but he was usually nice or at least tolerable with me. And he was good looking. But he wasn't… he wasn't...

Angel screamed.

I turned around briskly, suddenly regaining control of all my limbs. I knew her voice, I knew her screams. I'd heard her squeals when she won Mario Bros. mini-games, I'd heard her groan when she lost.

But I'd never heard sheer fear in her screams, and that was exactly what I heard in that moment. And some of that fear sunk into me as I saw her, dangling on the monkey bars from only a few fingers.

She was staring at something below her, though, the real source of her fear. It was a big black mass that just sort of moved around in its spot beneath Angel. I saw it move, it half-jumped and half… half-scurried? No. It half-_crawled_.

I'd never seen a spider that big.

"Oh, God," I murmured. I jumped to my feet. I didn't know what Dylan was doing—probably gaping or something—and I didn't know if Fang or Lissa had even _seen_ Angel. But I had.

For a moment I actually turned around to see if Fang was already running after her. His reflexes weren't as slow as my brain felt in that moment. Angel screamed again, drawing my attention back to her, but it was too late. I'd seen Fang—oh, I'd seen him alright.

I cursed at him under my breath—repeatedly—and then I ran. I ran straight towards Angel and I didn't think twice about it. I ran and I ran until I was right next to her. I screamed something at her, I think I told her to hold on, and then I told Hayley to stay right where she was.

Up close, I easily identified the spider. It was a tarantula, no doubt, one of those rare dessert ones you sometimes see here in Arizona, right before winter begins. It was black, but it had a strange pattern traced on its back. I knew about patterns on spiders—they meant something bad.

And as I studied it while Angel dangled on the monkey bars behind me in slow motion, the tarantula actually turned to face me. And it charged.

You guys have been listening to me rant about this week's events for a while now, so you already have a basic idea of what type of person I am. I do tend to act on impulse—stupidly—and though I do mess up a lot, things somehow work out in the end for me. Somewhat.

So I did just that—I acted on impulse, and I kicked the thing till kingdom come. Or, at least, several feet away. It landed, dazed, and then it charged again.

Fang came to the rescue in that moment, what with his amazing timing—dripping sarcasm here. He kicked it, too, but his kick threw it all the way to the other end of the park. He called something out—I think he told me to run.

I did just that, taking Angel into my arms. I turned to look at Hayley, who, the last time I'd seen her, had been seated at the top of the slide. She wasn't there anymore.

I turned back and saw Dylan carrying Hayley away, Lissa somehow running behind them in her heels. I ran with Angel in my arms, not bothering to see if Fang was behind us, and I ran all the way to the apartment building. I ran all the way into the elevator, which Dylan kindly held open for me.

Fang came in after us, but the elevator was already closing. Lissa called out his name, lunging for the 'keep open' button, but Dylan pulled her away. I still don't know why he did it but, hey, I'm not complaining, and I certainly wasn't at the time either.

So I didn't bother clicking the button, either, instead choosing to watch his glare fade between the now closed metallic doors.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Although the elevator ride with Dylan, Lissa, Angel, and Hayley should've been awkward, it went on without incident and mostly in silence.

Lissa just quietly stood there, pouting. Dylan still had Hayley in his arms, who still looked kind of shaken. I held onto Angel as she whimpered quietly into my shoulder.

I finally breathed. The spider had been big, probably dangerous, but I'd seen worse than that. I was okay on the inside—the spider hadn't been the one to shake me up so much. It'd been something quite different, actually, but I wasn't about to admit that out loud—not even in my head.

Dylan and Lissa were on the second floor, so Dylan gave me a half-smile as he and Lissa walked out of the elevator, leaving me alone with Angel. I set Angel down on the floor and gave her a small reassuring smile. She smiled back and took my hand.

When we arrived at the apartment, Fang was somehow already there. I brushed past him, still holding Angel's hand. He put a hand on my shoulder, trying to pull me back. I shrugged it off and continued walking, and didn't turn around till I was safe in Angel's room with the door locked behind me.

I crouched down to Angel's height. "Are you okay?"

She nodded, looking down. She had a few tear marks trailing down her cheeks, but they were all dry. That was good.

"You know it wouldn't have hurt you, right? I'm too scary for it to try and go past me."

Angel giggled. "Right."

I stood up. "Let's get you into your PJs. Do you want to go to sleep right now, or later? I don't think either of us wants to eat dinner so…"

Angel thought about it. "I'm tired."

I nodded. While I took her nightdress out of the drawers, Angel sat on her bed and took off her shirt and her shoes. She pulled the nightdress on, and then she pulled her pants off. She got into bed, I whispered goodnight, and, just as I was about to leave, she whispered: "Stay?"

I turned around, and my gaze softened. She was still scared. "Just until you fall asleep."

She nodded, patting the spot next to her.

I sat down next to her, but when I saw the look she was giving me, I grinned and laid down beside her. "Just until you fall asleep," I repeated, yawning. Oh, great. So my system _now_ decided to remind me I have to sleep, too.

Angel nodded and closed her eyes. "Thanks, Max. You're not scared of big, ugly spiders."

"Nah," I said. "Big, ugly spiders are scared of me."

"Hmm," Angel mumbled, settling into her sheets. For a moment she was silent, and I thought she'd actually fallen asleep, just like that. But then she spoke up: "He didn't mean to, Max. I saw it—that girl kissed him, not the other way around."

I bit my lip and tried hard not to scream. "Goodnight, Angel."

She sighed but then turned onto her side, and her breathing eventually relaxed into a steady pattern.

I stared up at the ceiling, pondering more pressing matters that I really didn't feel like pondering. I knew Fang was still out there in the hallway, maybe in the living room. What was he thinking right then?

Wait a minute. Why did I care? I shouldn't care—I knew _he_ didn't care. Certainly not. He'd kissed Lissa—I'd seen him. He didn't even turn around to see why Angel was screaming, he just kept on kissing that horrible, stupid, idiotic redhead. That… that… argh!

I exhaled deeply. He'd said he didn't know what he'd done. _Quit being so damn cryptic_, he'd said. _Quit being so damn cryptic_ _and tell me what the hell I did, what I started._

I got mad right then. I'd been mad the entire day but, right then, I really felt it. I really saw red, I felt my insides clench. My brain felt like it was suffocating in a fire, my heartbeat raced against itself.

He said he didn't know what he'd done. And yet there he was, just doing it all over again.

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><p><strong>Edited: 11.18-24.2012. <strong>

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><p><strong>AN:<strong>

**I feel particularly proud of the outcome of this chapter, once edited. It was so OOC, I tried not to cry while re-reading. Still could use some work, but I love the tension. It'd come off as too simple and lighthearted before.**

**-DemiSpy.**


	8. Trick or Treat

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

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><p>Chapter 8<p>

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><p><em>Day 6 – Saturday – October 31<em>_st_

Alarm bells began to go off in my head the moment I woke up. I wasn't in my bed, I wasn't in my room. I felt it before I saw it.

When I decided to crack an eye open, I relaxed. I'd fallen asleep in Angel's room. Right-o.

Angel wasn't next to me. I craned my neck to look at the clock on her bedside table—that hurt, by the way. My neck felt stiff and my legs were cramped. Not the best idea ever to fall asleep there. It was half past eleven, not necessarily a new record, but not quite normal for me either.

I was still in my clothes from the previous day, and my hair didn't smell all that great. I decided that my first point of order would be to take a shower. Seeing as Angel was probably in the living room with Fang or something, I could relax for a while.

While I showered, I thought. The day's course of action sounded simple in my head—avoid Fang, coddle Angel as an apology. I felt bad about the way I'd treated her the day before.

Sure, I hadn't treated Fang in the best way either, but he definitely deserved it. I was tired of him. He always said the same thing—_I don't know what I did_. Always the same excuse. Always. If he hadn't wanted to hurt me, why did he keep doing it, hmm? What a whacko.

After I got dressed, my stomach rumbled. Great timing, as per usual. Deciding to put on a brave face, I tried to smile and walked out of my room. My plan was set—if I bumped into Fang, I'd look away. If I bumped into Angel, I'd smile wider.

If I bumped into both, which was most likely to happen, I'd just pretend Fang wasn't there. Or something.

Fortunately for me, I only bumped into Angel, who was watching morning cartoons on TV. Fang was nowhere in sight.

"Hey," I said, sliding next to her on the couch.

Angel grinned up at me. She was about to speak up, but my grumbling stomach interrupted her. She giggled. "Hi, Max! Fang left breakfast in the kitchen for you."

I did not wince at the mention of his name. I really didn't. Instead, I made a show of grinning wider and jumping to my feet. "Food!"

Angel giggled. Success!

I took my plate of eggs, which was getting cold—as if I cared. I took my seat next to Angel and, despite trying to contain the question, I asked as nonchalantly as I could: "Where is The Silent One, anyway?"

Why did I call him that? Seriously, if I'd wanted to remember the previous day I would've done it voluntarily. Damn you, Dylan. Ahem. Excuse my potty mind.

"He went to the grocery store," Angel said.

My eyebrows shot up. "He… what?"

Angel shrugged. "He went shopping."

I sputtered, then burst out laughing. "He went… shopping! Oh, wow, that's… that's new." I laughed some more. "That's not weird at all."

Angel rolled her eyes. "He said something like that when he left. Anyway, that's not important. I wanted to ask you something."

I munched on my food. "Mmhm?" I swallowed.

"Well," Angel said, staring at me. "Today is October 31… I wanted to know if we could go Trick or Treating later."

I briefly wondered when Angel had last gone Trick or Treating… properly. Did the orphanage take them? Even if they did… was it the same? This was my golden shot—I could totally make up for yesterday with this. "Sure, Angel. You're in charge of breaking the news to The Silent One, though. I'm not going through that ordeal."

Angel giggled. "Done. Thank-you, Max!" She hugged me, which I considered sweet. "Also, I wanted to ask if you feel better. So… feeling better?"

I furrowed my brow, swallowing the last of my breakfast. I stood up to leave my plate in the sink. Hmm… do we have any juice left? "Err… I'm not sick, Angel. And I wasn't sick yesterday, either."

She shook her head. "No, Max! I mean, are you okay now? You sounded all… mad."

"Oh." Not the best topic to bring up, Angel. I opened the fridge door. No juice. Darn. "Yeah, I'm… I'm fine."

"Fang was right," Angel said. "You're a bad liar."

I shot up, nearly bumping my heard with the fridge. I turned to glare at Angel. "Thanks for the update."I shut the fridge door and walked back to my spot on the couch. So much for juice. "I'm fine, though. Seriously."

"Okay," she shrugged. "In that case, if you're perfectly fine, I'm sure you can tell me what happened, right?"

"Nothing happened, Angel. I just… I was in a bad mood yesterday."

"What about before that? _Something_ happened—you told me the other night, remember? You ate my cookies."

Ooh, she was good. Cookie blackmail is the worst. "I'm not going to talk about that." I vaguely heard my phone ringing in the background. "Hold on," I told Angel.

I ran to my room and picked up my phone. Caller ID—Ella. Oh, great. My day couldn't get much better, could it?

I picked up. "May I be of assistance, sister dearest that hasn't called all week? It's quite a miracle, if you ask me." I paused. "Not that I'm complaining."

"_Ever the jokester. Good morning, sister dearest. Have a few minutes for me?_"

I bit my lip, peeking out the door. Angel was waiting for me with her arms crossed. I gave her the universal sign for 'give me a couple minutes', and then turned to sit down on my bed. "Please, take your time," I said into the phone.

"_Ooh_," Ella said. "_Trouble in paradise?_"

"Ha. Ha. Hear me laughing."

"_Will do. Listen, I've been holding it in all week, but I'm dying here. How's life been?_"

I took a full minute to actually process that. "You're calling me, completely out of the blue, to ask what's going on?"

"_Err… yes?_"

I didn't buy it. "Ella, what did you do?"

She sighed into the phone. "_Okay, I was going to tell you anyway. Err… I think. Answer this: did you go get ice cream with Fang and Angel on Monday?_"

I raised my eyebrows. "How did you know that?"

Ella gasped. "Oh_, my gosh! Oh, gosh, this is… this is golden!_" She paused, but I knew she was going to say something else. "_I feel like such a stalker._"

"Umm… Ella? Clueless big sister waiting for answers here…"

She wasn't paying attention to me anymore. Damn. I'd lost her. "_Wait, wait. I need more proof,_" she said. "_Did you… let me think, did you go to the mall on Wednesday?_"

I thought about that. Wednesday… Wednesday… "Yeah. Again, how did you know that?"

Again, she paid no mind. "_Oh, gosh, this is too much. Okay, Max, I've gotta go because if I don't, I'll blow it. Cannot afford to do that. Oh, wow. This is big._" She paused. "_I need to call someone. See ya, Max! Thanks for the info!_"

"Ella! No, Ella, wait"—she hung up—"shoot."

I placed my phone on the bedside table. Okay, I thought. That was plain weird.

I walked out of my room and sat back down next to Angel. "Sorry," I told her. "My sister called."

Angel nodded. "So… tell me?"

I avoided her gaze. The Bambi Eyes were dangerous, I knew. "Angel, no. I… I can't."

Angel sighed. "Look, I don't want to be pushy. Trust me, I know how that feels." She paused. "I just… well, Fang told me his side of it, okay? Now I want to know yours."

That got my attention. "He told you?"

Angel nodded. "I won't say a word of it."

I'd figured that out on my own. "Okay, and I suppose that if I tell you, Fang won't find out either?" Wait, no. Rewind, freeze, and freaking delete. What was I doing? Do not give in!

"Of course," Angel said. She stood on the couch, getting close enough to make sure she met my gaze. "Please, Max? I just want to help."

I closed my eyes. Beware the Bambi eyes… "Why? It's our… issue. Why would you want to help?"

Ouch. That came out harsher than I'd meant. My bad.

"I…" Angel faltered, making me open my eyes. She was staring down at her feet. "I don't like seeing you all sad and angry, like yesterday." She looked up at me. "You should be happy. I'm happy with you guys."

That was, believe it or not, the single most emotional speech I'd ever heard. The Martinez family isn't the emotional type—when Jeb left us, we all grew a backbone.

Angel suddenly reminded me of Samantha, the little girl I'd babysat back in Mexico. Sammy told me something like that once, in her five year-old naïveté. "Why are people sad? Being happy is nicer."

Strong words, kid. They really… got to me.

Fine," I found myself saying. "Just… no questions at the end. And no interruptions. Deal?"

Angel nodded. "Deal."

A runaway thought in the back of my mind realized that Angel was good at the manipulation thing, something I had to take note of in the future. She didn't even use the Bambi eyes this time!

Angel was looking at me expectantly. I took a deep breath-that was the first time in two months that I talked about it. Big moment. "Okay. I moved here a couple months back, in August. My mom and… my dad got back together this summer, and my dad wanted us to move here with him. His job and all, you know? So we did.

"About a week after Ella and I started school, Iggy—Fang's brother—came over to work on a project with Ella. Fang drove Iggy there. He and Ella weren't going to take long, so Fang stayed. He was in some of my classes, and he seemed like a nice person to me. Quiet, sure. But at the time he wasn't all dark and broody."

Something in the back of my mind wondered if Angel knew what broody even meant. She didn't say anything, though, so I just continued. "We talked and joked around for a while that afternoon. He helped me with my Chem homework—my personal worst nightmare. We became friends. We started hanging out at school, my friends Sam and J.J. eventually joined us, too."

I closed my eyes for a moment. Those were the good times… "Things were going great for the four of us. Fang and I got really close. One day, we were doing homework at his house. We were laughing about something and… I don't know. We just got quiet all of a sudden, and he was staring at me. You don't know how that felt… I always feel it whenever he's watching me. It's… it's something.

"He kissed me that day. I'm not proud to say that I ran out on him. I was… I don't know, scared? What if I messed up? He was my friend, my best friend, and I was scared of losing him. Sure, I had feelings for him, too, but that didn't mean I had to pay attention to them, right? I don't know what I was thinking, I just ran out."

I breathed deeply, suddenly realizing I'd been about to start ranting. "The next day I avoided him. I didn't know what to think. It took me about a week to figure things out, I guess. But I came to terms with the fact that he liked me, and I liked him, and that was what counted, right? So I went to school that day with the firm decision to talk to him about it—to apologize."

I paused. "I don't do apologies, Angel. I'm not good at that 'swallow your pride' business. It was a huge deal. I walked out of first period that day, looking for him. We had chemistry together next, and I wanted to talk to him about it before class."

I pursed my lips. "I found him. And I had a good three minutes before chemistry, enough time to stumble out an apology and an 'I can explain'. He was… he was with Lissa, the girl from the park. He was kissing her. His hands were in her hair, and she was… I'm not going to describe it, for the sake of your innocence. I stood there, paralyzed, for a while. The bell rang and I was still frozen, and they were still kissing. He didn't push her off.

"I skipped chemistry, I ditched class, and I simply ran all the way to my house. I locked myself in my room and refused to come out. I'd been so ridiculously close to making a fool of myself! So, so close. How stupid I'd been to think he liked me—he just played with me for a while. He had a reputation at school, and I'd stupidly believed him when he said it was a lie."

I sighed. "Ella asked, and I didn't bother lying. I told her everything, she told Iggy, and Iggy pounded Fang. Iggy asked him questions, he threatened and blackmailed him. Fang didn't care. I told Iggy to let it go after a while. Sam and J.J. took my side. While I feel bad about it, I think he deserved it.

"He did try to talk to me twice after that. I didn't listen, and I don't regret that. Whatever he would've told me would've been a lie. He always lied." I sighed. "This week, at times I honestly thought he'd changed, Angel, but yesterday proved me wrong. I refuse to look stupid again. That's what happened."

I sighed and breathed deeply a couple of times. I'd cried too much already—I would not cry anymore. I refused to do so.

Angel was silent for a long time. "I don't think he meant it that way, Max."

Great, so she's siding with him. That's new. "Whatever, Angel. I already did my half of the agreement. I don't want to talk about this anymore, alright? Too many memories."

Angel bit her lip. "Okay, Max."

I stood up. In that moment, I heard keys jingling, and I froze. I heard the click of the doorknob, and the door opened slowly. I heard Fang's footsteps freeze.

I didn't turn around, and I ran to my room, locking the door behind me.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I finished my homework.

I had nothing to do. The expense report was done, sans Fang's early morning shopping, but there was no way on Earth I'd ask for the receipt. He'd leave it in my room later, like he'd been doing the past few days. In the meantime, though, I really needed something to do.

I could not step out of my room. I didn't want to face Angel. And, after that morning's rush of memories, I certainly didn't want to see… _him_.

I sat on my bed and placed my laptop on my lap. I closed the page I'd been using for my History homework. No one was logged into Facebook, so that threw the possibility of a conversation out the window. I looked around my 'recent' tabs, looking for something to do.

That was when I saw it. I'd completely forgotten about Fang's blog in the past couple of days.

I hovered over the tab. I didn't want to click it. I knew all the answers I wanted were there, but I also knew I could find out more that I wanted to know. And what was the whole point of avoiding _him_ if I went on and practically stepped into his head?

I squeezed my eyes shut, and counted to ten. Yes… No… But…

I clicked it.

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_Friday, October 30._

New Blog Post: Day 5

Yo.

Today was eventful. We (that is, the girl, the kid, and myself) started the day off with a revelation—yes, the girl now knows the kid speaks English. Followed up with an argument (performed by the girland yours truly) over the kitchen tap and our little issue. Next up we have a freak attack by the world's largest tarantula, and me being shunned away from an elevator.

But let's take it step by step.

The girl walked in on me and the kid talking (in English) this morning. She was still in her PJs and morning hair, and she wasn't even half-awake. Let's leave it at quarter-awake. She then proceeded to gape, then stare, and then ask a few questions. We cleared up the issue, and all is well now between the girl and the kid—the kid seriously worried over whether the girl would be mad or not.

What's interesting—and depressing—was the story. The question that simply couldn't be avoided (Why don't you speak English? Why such a big secret?) was obviously not avoided. The girl asked, the kid answered, and let me tell you—we did _not_ expect the answer. At least, I didn't.

It's something personal for the kid, so I won't go into detail about it. Plus, I'm starting to worry that someone from the orphanage will find these posts and her secret will be out. That'd be bad. I'll only tell you that she really impressed both me and the girl. Maybe little kids are deeper thinkers than we give them credit for.

She is officially speaking in English around us, though, so the girl is having a blast. No more translating duty for her!

Moving on. We had breakfast and, surprisingly, the girl volunteered to help with the dishes afterwards. I blew it, of course. We were getting along nicely, and then I opened my mouth.

It happened sort of like this. We were laughing, and I thought that it was weird how we were always so tense around each other. Couldn't we just laugh like this all the time? True, I'm not much of a laugher but… well, laughing around her is different. And that's as mushy as I get, so quit your cooing, ladies.

So our laughing died down eventually and we continued doing dishes, and that was when I decided to open up my damned mouth: _"Why do you avoid me so much?"_

At the time I was genuinely curious , and it was until the words were out that I realized what I'd just said. She tried to avoid the topic—giving me an excellent opening to do so while at it—, and still I took the stubborn approach. I convinced myself that I _needed_ to say this, to hear her side of it. I had to.

We argued. Cryptic as ever, she didn't give me the answer I wanted. She said, and I quote: "You decided I wasn't good enough." And then: "We both changed, but you started it. I just tagged along."

I do not know how to translate that into English. Girls, care to help a guy? If you know how to translate that from your language to English, please do so in the comments. That's as close to an answer as I've gotten in that past two months.

Now, I want to say that was the end of it, but it wasn't. I blew up right then. I just… I'm so tired of trailing behind her, begging for answers. I guess I'm really not over her, I admit it. But I need to know what I did. I can't do this anymore—if she won't tell me, then fine, I'll leave her be.

I sadly said something like that out loud—I was already seething, please understand—which landed me in my current predicament. I made it worse later on, but I'll talk about that in a minute. The point is, I said: "Quit being so damn cryptic, and tell me what the hell I did, what I started."

And that, gentlemen, is how you mess up. Big time.

[By the way, I said we fought over the tap. See, as we argued and retorted, we took turns turning the tap on (her) and off (me).]

This time, I walked out on her. I locked myself into my room and banged my head against the wall a couple of time. I responded to some of your comments.

She took up the same tactic and locked herself into her room for the rest of the afternoon. Where was the kid during all of this? Taking a shower. When she came out, she noticed both doors locked and, to my surprise, she chose to knock on mine first.

I felt bad about how our argument was affecting the kid, so I let her torture me with that dreaded Wii game—I'm banning My Little Pony from the country someday.

I made lunch after that, and sent the kid to ask the girl if she wanted to eat. The girl said no thanks.

The kid and I ate while playing Wii—fun, yet difficult. She'd relented to playing Mario Bros. by then, thankfully.

A while later, the kid got worried about the girl, and it was then when she questioned me about what'd happened. And I explained.

Getting advice from a seven-year-old just borders on desperate, but that was me at the time. The kid actually came up with an idea—a brilliant idea—to get the girl to talk to me for once, really talk to me. I won't talk about it here, as a precaution, but I'll talk about it once I've carried it out. Sounds fair? No? Too bad.

The kid really got worried after that, so she went off to remind the girl that she _had_ to eat. The girl walked out of her room ten minutes later. She went into the kitchen—I heard her rummage around the pantry—and then she walked back into her room.

I was starting to get annoyed. The girl I knew didn't hide from her problems, locked in her room doing… whatever she was doing. It wasn't until later, though, that I snapped. Not my smartest moment, but this time I can honestly say I was doing the right thing.

The kid told me she wanted to go to the park. I felt bad—we'd been cooped up in the apartment all day—so I told her that we could. She ran off to get the girl, excited. We both knew that the girl would only listen to her, so I didn't even bother trying to go tell her myself.

I gaped when the kid came back a moment later, head down. She said that the girl was doing homework, that she had a lot of stuff to do. The girl had, apparently, also said that we'd go to the park the next day.

I really did get angry then—the whole seeing red and not thinking straight shebang. I told the kid to get her sweater and to wait at the door, and then I stalked straight into the girl's room. She was hunched over a notebook, comfortably seated on her bed, surrounded by just about every textbook she owned. I said something right then, I can't remember what. Then I took her notebook and pushed her books away. With my free hand, I pulled her up.

I _can _remember what I said right then, though. I said, and I quote: "You are angry at me, not at The kid. You won't listen to me, but you'll listen to The kid. I expect you to be at the door in one minute, a smile plastered on your face. We're going to the park and you're going to like it, am I clear?"

I was so angry at her. She got mad, too, and said something about me treating her like a child. I told her to stop acting like a child. Then I told her to bring a sweater, and I walked out.

Guess what? She came alright but… yeah, she didn't bring a sweater. Ever the rebellious type.

Once we were at the park, though, I started to feel bad. I knew things weren't easy for her, either. We were both at fault (or so she led me to believe) in this, and I had crossed a line back there. It wasn't fair of her to bring the kid into this, but still.

At any rate, I was about to say something—maybe an apology, I'm not sure—but then the girl interrupted me. She pointed to a couple standing at the end of the park—the only other people there besides us, the kid, and another little girl that had taken to playing with the kid on the jungle gym—and she started to ask me if they weren't familiar or something. See, she got cut off by a loud, high-pitched squeal that vaguely sounded like my name.

I can honestly say that I flinched. I know those squeals. They haunt my nightmares.

To anyone who guessed it was the skank, well, I'd give you a million-dollar prize, but I'm broke. Anne's the one with the money in the family. Sorry.

So we ran into the skank and her partner, blondie. Blondie is the guy crushing on the girl—not her friend, the other guy. The jerk.

So, to my annoyance, the skank decided I was up for a conversation. Blondie decided the girl was up for a conversation. Is there any free will left in this country?

Anyhow. I tuned the skank out and immersed myself in my own thoughts, occasionally nodding. I thought a lot about my argument with the girl that morning—trying to locate some sort of clue. I took every word she said apart, trying to figure out what she meant.

I knew I'd done something. The only hint she really gave as to what I did was: "You decided I wasn't good enough." What did that mean, anyway? Good enough for what? And how the hell did I decide? I didn't say anything, so she definitely inferred it from something I did (she does that a lot), but thus we return to the question: _what did I do?_

Do you realize how much stress I've been carrying for two months?

As I pondered that last thought, I was brutally assaulted by none other than the skank. First she locked her arms around my neck with that vice-like grip of hers. Alarms began to go off in my head. I pushed her off but she wouldn't let go, so I faced her with a glare.

Too late, though, 'cause the moment I met her (pretty scary) gaze, she lunged and, not only did she kiss me, she also bumped foreheads with me. That really hurt. She has a thick skull.

I tried pushing her off again, but then I heard the scream. I went still for a moment as it registered in my head that it'd been the kid who screamed. She screamed again, and this time I really did push the skank off. She landed on the ground with a thud (not my intention, but she brought it upon herself), and that was when I saw it. The girl kicked the biggest spider I'd ever seen away from its spot beneath the kid (who was dangling from the monkey bars by only a couple fingers).

The tarantula (I realized it wasn't a spider a moment later) started to run back after the girl, this time faster, so I went on and kicked it too. Then I told the girl to run. I kicked the thing once again for good measure (not very smart, I know), and then I ran after the girl. She'd taken the kid with her, and the skank, her partner, and her kid were already at the apartment building.

I'm still not sure what to think about what happened. It was sudden, and freaky, but in some stupid way I'm thankful for it—it did save me from the skank's clutches. And we all came out unscathed.

Well, no, scratch that last bit. I think the kid is traumatized—and I feel bad about it because, in some indirect way, we wouldn't have gone if I hadn't pressure the girl into going. Also, and this is a big issue for me, the girl is very angry. Seething, in fact.

When I got back to the apartment building, she was in an elevator with the skank and her partner, the kid, and the other kid. The elevator doors were closing already and, even though the skank tried to keep them open for me (blondie pulled her back for me), the girl let them close, glaring at me the entire time.

And so a little question mark popped into my head, but this one I solved easily. She'd seen the skank manhandling (womanhandling?) me. Perfect. Just perfect.

I took another elevator. I arrived at the apartment first (she probably had to stop at the skank's floor, which bought me some time) but even though I was standing at the door, waiting, she walked past me without so much as a glance. I knew she'd do that. I waited outside the kid's door, but she never came out. Maybe she knew I was standing there? I went into my room for a few minutes and waited, but the door didn't open.

I checked on her a while ago. The door to the kid's room was locked, but the girl's wasn't. A door connected both rooms, so I went through that one instead. Smart, right?

The girl fell asleep on the kid's bed. How both girls managed to fall asleep there (and in such a short timespan) I had no clue. For a moment I pondered carrying the girl to her room, but decided against it. Who knew what she'd do if she realized it. Plus, there was the possibility that she was feigning sleep, but I discarded that one pretty easily. She snored briefly (but don't tell her I noticed).

Instead, I pulled her shoes off and sort of tucked her in. What startled me a little was that, when I pulled the covers atop of her, I noticed some moonlight falling onto her face, and something was shining on it.

The girl doesn't cry. She just… doesn't. It's not her. It was only one tear, but let me tell you, it's something you see every thousand years. Or, at least, something _I_ see every thousand years.

I realized I don't know a lot of things about her, right there, in that moment. I didn't know she could cry, as stupid as that sounds. And I felt even worse for everything I'd said to her that day. I refuse to think that tear is my fault. The nagging thought is there, of course, but I will not pay attention to it. I will not. Brain, shut down.

Anyhow. I wiped the tear off with a finger, and then walked out of the room. Now I'm sitting here, on my bed, typing these last few sentences before I post this. Nothing besides what I'm typing is crossing my head—I really, honestly can't think.

And, thusly, I don't know what to think. About anything.

Fly on,

-Nick.

TAGS: _freaky spider_; _argument; the __girl__; the __skank__; that guy; the __kid__; Home Eco; Project: Family; PF-Day 5_

*Nick does not use real people's names in his blog posts without express permission from said people. These names may be aliases chosen by said people. Please don't waste your time trying to 'sue' Nick in the comments section. It gets annoying after a while. Thank-you.*

My thought process immediately after I finished reading: …

My thought process two minutes later: … … …

I won't lie—temptation to stop reading did come up as I read. I felt like a stalker, like a… I don't know. Reading his post equaled to an invasion of privacy—that's what he gets for posting his thoughts on the web—and I wasn't all about that sort of stuff.

For a moment I just stared at the screen. I could gather a lot from what I'd just read but… well, okay. I didn't want to know any of that. No, wait, I did want to know. I'd really, really wanted to know. But I hadn't wanted to _read_ it! And I hadn't wanted to feel _bad_ about it!

Gosh. If life _supposed _to be complex and dramatic all the time? Honestly.

A few lines glared out at me. One of them—_I'm so tired of trailing behind her, begging for answers. _To be perfectly honest, I hadn't seen if from his point of view. Sure, I hadn't actually _known_ he'd been after answers—not the whole time. Brownie points for me, right? Right?

_I guess I'm really not over her, I admit it. _I didn't want to ponder that one. No need to get all frazzled right now. Ignoring it… ignoring it…

…_I heard the scream. I went still for a moment […] this time I really did push the skank off. She landed on the ground with a thud…_

What could a girl think about that? Oh, shoot, I messed that one up badly? Oh, he's just playing innocent for his fans?

I closed the window, not wanting to be tempted to read another post. He probably had a post for every day of the week—that's some powerful temptation, people.

I crossed my legs and put my chin in my hand. I sat there for a while, just mulling over everything. Could I believe his posts? Could I believe everything I'd read? Could I… did I understand him?

Fear bubbled up inside of me. What if I'd gotten it all wrong? I couldn't have—he was the one at fault here! He'd always been at fault—he'd kissed that… that _skank_. Twice. Maybe more than twice. And he'd ignored me. And… and… and he'd hurt me.

I breathed deeply. Still, according to his (supposedly) innermost thoughts, I'd hurt him, too.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

By the time lunchtime arrived, I'd spent about two hours seated on my bed, just thinking. Talk about meditation…

During my unbelievable two hours of _thinking_, I'd come to a conclusion. It was a bittersweet one, in my opinion, and it involved a lot of pride swallowing. If you recall from my earlier conversation with Angel—not my forte. By a long shot.

In short, I'd decided to start anew. Just… a clean slate sort of thing. I'd get a _new_ first impression of… of Fang. And I'd try my best to stop jumping to conclusions, even if it meant asking a ton of pointless questions. I'd… start over.

Maybe that was the whole morale of my life. Starting over when Jeb left us, then again when I moved to Arizona that summer… maybe I was supposed to do this. It was risky—I _could_ end up looking like a fool, and I _could_ be fooling myself right then, to be honest. Who was I to say this would work? What could assure me that my conclusion was correct, that I was doing the right thing?

Nothing. And yet there I was, taking a shot at it. Did Fang drug my breakfast or something?

Speaking of food, I was talking about lunchtime. Important stuff. See, my meditation was nearly done, but was cut short by a couple knocks on my door. I first thought it was Angel—Fang and I had, sadly, been using her as a mediator of sorts in the past few days. Another thing to apologize for, I mentally noted.

Instead, much to my surprise, it was Fang. An immediate impulse came over me—I wanted to glare at him, and badly. And I really, really wanted to say some things.

"I know you're mad," he said. Straight to the point. "Just… put it aside for two more days. I give you the right to punch me on Monday, if you want to."

I nearly gaped. He was thinking about Angel. I swallowed, looking for my voice. "I…" I cleared my throat. "Yeah, okay."

He exhaled, to which I raised an eyebrow. "Food's ready," he said simply. Then he walked out.

I sat back on my bed for a moment. Then I stood up and followed him out the door.

_Food's ready_, I thought. _Humph. The manipulation thing is contagious—best keep an eye on that_.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

About forty minutes after I stood up from my well-worn spot on my bed, I found myself seated in Fang's car. I rode in the backseat with Angel, arms crossed and pouting while at it.

Before I get into the events that followed our little road trip—which, by the way, involved giggles on Angel's side and a couple snickers from Fang—I'll briefly show you what _caused_ said trip.

It happened something like this:

I sat down to eat my food—hurray for pizza!—and was met with two pairs of eyes, staring at me intently. "What?" I asked. Yes, my mouth was full as I said that. Deal with it.

Angel shook her head. "I was telling Fang about our conversation this morning—"

I nearly spat my food out. "—WHAT?"

Angel frowned. "—you said we would go Trick or Treating, remember?"

Oh, that. I risked a glance at Fang—his brow was furrowed, with a hint of amusement. Humph.

Angel was still looking at me expectantly. She did that a lot, I noticed. I looked back down at my food. Casually, I said: "I did?" Then: _Oh… Shoot. I did. _"Oh, yeah. Trick or Treating. Fun. Candy. Right!"

Angel looked at me. "Yeah… anyway. I was telling Fang that we should go shopping after lunch. He says it's fine—we can go, right Max?"

I frowned. "Shopping? Trick or Treating usually equals free candy, doesn't it?"

Angel laughed. "No, Max! We need _costumes_."

And so we return to my current predicament—Fang's car. Shopping. Stores. Gah.

I knew I'd done the right thing—I still had to make up for yesterday with Angel, right? And I knew we _had_ to get out of the apartment—the park idea had failed, after all. Fang and Angel could play Wii for only so long.

So there we were, looking for a parking spot at the mall's parking lot. Angel was grinning, I was pouting, and Fang was… I'm not sure. He was driving.

As far as I knew, the mall only had one shop that sold costumes. Sure, department stores and the like had some, too, but only one store was exclusively for costumes. And that was our target.

It was a two-floor shop, filled to the brim with racks and racks of costumes that touched the ceiling. Of course, the racks weren't as full as they usually were—most costumes were, of course, gone by then. A good load of them still remained, though.

I started to panic when we stepped in. Angel immediately walked towards a gypsy-woman mannequin, and she stared at it intently before turning to look at me, then back at it. "Oh, no you don't," I told her. I took her by the shoulders to the children's section. "We came here for you."

Angel quirked an eyebrow, but said nothing. She turned away from me, and a few moments later I lost her among the racks.

"You're taking this well."

I jumped a little. "Don't—do—that."

Fang made a _tsk_ sound. "You've spent all week trying to make me talk—now you tell me to stop. Bipolarity _is_ a mental issue, y'know?"

"Ha-ha."

Angel came up to me in that moment. She had some sort of pink contraption in her hands. "What do you think?"

I studied it. Ruffles, ribbons, glitter, pink. Puffiness. "It looks… girly."

Fang snickered. "Ever so eloquent."

I rolled my eyes. "Try it on," I told Angel. "Changing rooms are…"I looked around. "There."

Angel nodded and walked off to the right. I trailed after her, Fang close behind. I stopped in my tracks, but Fang didn't bump into me as I expected. I spoke up anyway: "If you're going to follow me around, at least walk beside me. You look like a badly-trained stalker."

He chuckled, and did as I said. "If I were a stalker, I'd be the best out there."

"Undoubtedly," I muttered, thinking of the scare he'd given me a few minutes ago.

Angel walked out of the dressing room, interrupting our… conversation, if that's what you can call it. She looked too pink, too puffy, and too… frilly. "No," I said. "No."

Fang rolled his eyes at me, but then Angel spoke up: "Yeah, you're right." She looked around for a moment. Then, her eyes lit up. She trudged over to one of the racks in the far edge of the store. She pulled out a white dress, hidden amongst most of the bulk.

When she pulled it out, a halo fell to the floor. I grinned. Oh, the irony. "Better," I said. "Try it on—I like this idea already."

Angel nodded, grinning.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I want to get something straight with you all. Maximum Martinez doesn't usually dress up for Halloween—I'm not one to be something I'm not.

Fang obviously wasn't that sort of person, either, and yet lo and behold, we both dressed up. I've said it before and I'll say it again—beware the Bambi Eyes. Beware.

Angel not only convinced us to actually buy some sort of disguise, but she also lured us into… y'know, wearing it. There went my plans.

Angel did, after all, dress up as an angel. Fang's disguise (because it wasn't a costume) consisted of a pair of plastic fangs. And me… well, I'd originally thought of wearing one of those bunny ears headbands… but no, Angel said that Fang's special privileges didn't apply to me.

I didn't have the heart to argue with her—my big mistake—and so I ended up purchasing a costume. I didn't even get any say in it! Angel just decided that she liked how I looked, and then she told Fang to buy it.

Fang bought it.

We were an odd bunch that night, I'll give you that. Sure, I'd seen weirder groups, but we really did contrast. Fang was all dark an gloomy—black T-shirt, dark jeans, and his fake teeth of course—, then Angel was all sweet and… well, angelic. And me… well, I was Alice in Wonderland. In what category does that fit?

I had it all—the (too short) blue dress with the (disturbing) v-neck, the white apron, the (ridiculously high) stockings, the black shoes, and the black headband. Worst of all, I had to wear my hair down. And Angel insisted on mascara and lip gloss—the latter of which I wiped off the moment she turned away.

Fang laughed at my expense. Dissecting that statement a little: good thing—Fang laughed, bad thing—at my expense. You've got to admit, that sort of thing would be easier for first graders—subject, verb, and predicate be darned.

Now, here's a summary of the deal I offered Angel: we leave once your bucket is full, or once it's nine pm. Whichever comes first.

She'd argued for nine thirty. Fang said nine fifteen, and so nine fifteen it was. Because everyone should always listen to what Fang says.

Anyhow, I digress. I wore a jacket, trying to cover up that ridiculous V-neck. So far so good… except Mother Nature had this vendetta of sorts against me. Yesterday, no jacket. Yesterday, cold. Today, jacket. Today, hot.

Why? What did I do? I mean, the heat wasn't too bad… but I always was a cold sort of girl. Mother Nature, you and I have some unfinished business.

Again, I digress. Forgive me.

Trick or Treating around the apartment building was a big, fat no in my book. We had to do this thing correctly—especially if I'd already dressed up for the occasion. Sure, I also wanted to avoid… other residents of the building, but that's beside the point.

Thus, we went to my neighborhood. We stopped by my house and said hi to Ella. She kept giving me these weird looks while we were there, which made me think back to our conversation earlier. What had she said? She'd asked some questions about my week and… oh, yeah. Oh, my gosh!

Oh, wait. She also said, and I quote: I feel like such a stalker.

Why did that ring a bell? I never liked those feelings—they meant I was stupid enough to not notice something. I didn't like being stupid and oblivious. Bad experience, you see.

As I pondered that thought, Angel visited both my neighbors' houses, and then the rest of the street before heading towards the next one. Her bucket was filling up fast—people thought she was cute and absolutely adorable, and they just had to give her some extra candy.

I found it creepy. Creepier, however, was the fact that some people wanted to take pictures. This one guy actually came to ask if Angel would like to pose for a magazine—I didn't hear the details, 'cause Fang glared at the guy. The guy walked away.

Atta boy.

As people continued to coo over Angel—because she really did look adorable—, others began to notice the two weird teens behind her. Fang meant back off, while I was just the freak chick with a short dress.

I did not like my role in that. I did not enjoy it. I wanted it to end.

We went block by block, Angel's bucket filling up. She agreed to visit only two more houses, seeing as the candy would start pouring out soon enough. Let me tell you something—considering the conditions we laid out, Angel made sure to find a big bucket. She ditched the pretty one we got her at the costume store, settling for a small garbage can. It'd been in storage, so at least it was clean. And Angel tied a ribbon around it, so it looked pretty.

Smart kid.

While Angel knocked on one of the last houses on the street, I thought. Where, oh where had I heard that before? I feel like such a stalker. A stalker. Such a…

Whoa! Major light bulb moment! I actually gasped, but the sound was drowned out when the house's door opened—I heard some spooky tune in the background. I pondered my idea, paying no mind to the person at the door.

Could it really… it did fit with the conversation, and why Ella wouldn't want to tell me made sense… but…

"—some disguise, Fang! Very elaborate."

My head jerked up. I knew that voice. "Iggy?"

A flash of blond hair turning my way confirmed it. He studied me, those pale blue eyes of him scrutinizing my outfit, then my face.

I crossed my arms. "Ha. Ha. Take a picture, it'll last longer."

Iggy chuckled. "I might as well—this is a once in a lifetime sort of thing!" He kept on studying me. "Are you sure you're Max? Aren't you, like, her evil twin sister Maya or something?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Maya? Where'd that come from?" I paused. "Besides, you're infatuated with the only sister I have, so the whole evil sister thing is null."

Iggy's pale cheeks blushed as he glared. "Ha. Ha." He looked back and forth between Fang and me, before his gaze traveled down, settling on Angel. "You like me, right? Hanging out with these two meanies hasn't corrupted you?"

Angel giggled. "You're funny."

Iggy sighed. "Yeah, I get that a lot." He reached out for a big candy bowl. He pulled out a fist of candy, dropping it carefully in Angel's bucket—cough, trashcan, cough.

"Thanks, Ig," I told him, pulling Angel away.

He nodded. "Have fun," he said, though I heard him mutter: "not."

I gave him a sickly sweet smile, turning away with Angel and Fang.

"Who was that?" Angel asked.

"Iggy," I said. "Fang's brother."

"Oh," Angel said. She studied Fang. "He doesn't look like you."

I almost facepalmed. I knew this was a touchy subject for Fang—I'd wondered about the same thing many times before, but I'd only had the guts to ask once. I got no answer, and I never bothered trying to ask again.

Anne, their mom, was single as far as I concerned. I didn't know if she'd ever been married (or divorced), but I knew there was some sort of story back there. I also knew it was none of my business.

Fang looked uncomfortable, which is saying something. I stepped in: "Not all siblings look alike, Angel."

Angel pondered that. "Okay."

I nudged Fang on the shoulder. His gaze was very, very far away. "Yeah, okay?"

He nodded. I sighed.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

We were on our way back when it happened.

Winter was nearing, and so, even though it was only nine, it was reasonably dark outside. A lot of people were returning to their homes—the ones that stayed out had flashlights. The street lights helped, sure, but something about walking between shadows made me uncomfortable.

Mother Nature was lenient on me, and a chilly breeze began to pick up. Angel and Fang noticed it, too. Angel began to shiver a little—I gave her my jacket, thus revealing my absolutely wonderful outfit. I welcomed the cold, though. And Fang was the only nearby person that could actually appreciate the outfit—which, I'm not going to lie, he did peek at least once—so that didn't matter too much. It certainly mattered.

Anyhow, I think that was the problem.

As I already mentioned, it was dark, somewhat late, and it was a Saturday. The apartment building stood on the city outskirts, right before a forest of sorts (which I knew would soon enough be even more streets and apartment buildings). We were the only people out on those streets at that time.

That last statement was proved wrong when we found the drunkards.

There were six of 'em, and each smelled worse than the other. They all looked kind of old, maybe around thirty. The youngest had to be at least twenty-eight or so. They were dressed in moderately nice clothes, and there were two cars parked beside them.

Oh, yeah. They were seated on the sidewalk, piss drunk and laughing it all away.

Fang and I nodded to each other, and we decided to walk through the opposite side of the street. Just as we were crossing, one of them half-yelled and half-slurred: "Hey there, you! Blue skirt!"

"Ignore them," I muttered. "Just keep walking. Fang, hold Angel's other hand."

The slurring guy obviously knew how to hold his booze, or at least control its effects, because he actually stood up and began to walk over in our direction—he only stumbled once.

His comrades laughed as he continued to approach us—and we continued to walk, now nearly sprinting—away.

"Are you deaf, Blue Skirt? C'mon, have some fun!" he ran up to us, somehow, and he managed to get hold of my shoulder. Fang tried to intervene, but I pushed him away lightly. No need to provoke them, no need to provoke them…

I pushed his hand off, and took a step back. "Move it," I said. I was glaring at him intently, but the guy seemed to be immune. Only one person on this planet—Fang—was really, truly immune to my glare. Apparently, drunkards were immune as well.

"Only if you come with, Blue Skirt." He looked down. He tried to grasp the skirt of my dress, but I swatted his hand away. His head snapped up, and he glared. "You're coming with, you understand, Blue Skirt?"

He took hold of my shoulder again, this time with an iron grip I didn't think drunkards were capable of possessing, and that was when hell broke loose.

First I twisted out of the guy's grasp, kicking his legs out from under him. He fell onto the ground, thankfully unconscious, but by then his friends were only a couple feet away from us.

Fang took charge there, glare of doom and all set in place. He punched the first one that came up to us, and I heard a sickening crack. I turned to where Angel was standing, frozen behind a streetlight. I wanted to be mad at Fang for leaving her there, but I couldn't be.

I walked towards Angel and she immediately took hold of my legs. She was shaking.

I heard another crack, and I told Angel to cover her ears, to close her eyes, and to count to ten. I snuck a peek behind me—Fang was glaring at the two runaway idiots that couldn't find their footing. He had some blood on his hands, which he quickly wiped off on the back of his pants.

Two unconscious. Three running away. One still trying to stand up.

We ran.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

When we arrived back at the apartment, the first thing I did was take Angel to bed. Fang and I sat on either side of her bed, trying to calm her down. She was shaking, sobbing, and gasping. Not a combination I ever expected to see on her face, not even after yesterday.

I ran my fingers through Angel's hair while she clung to my neck. "It's okay," I told her. "We're okay."

I never was the best at that sort of thing.

Fang's fists were clenching and unclenching at an unsteady rhythm. I gave him a look—do I have to start soothing you, too?

He continued brooding.

"Angel, we're fine. Shh… calm down."

Angel nodded into my shoulder. She eventually quieted down, but I didn't let go of her. Her grip on my neck relaxed a while later, and then her hands fell to her sides. She was asleep.

Did Angel normally fall asleep when emotionally stressed? Such an awesome reflex, in my opinion.

Okay, not helping. Sorry. Moving on…

"I'll change her," I told Fang. "AKA, shoo."

He didn't crack a grin, but at least his fists felt flat at his sides. He stood up and walked out.

I knew he would wait for me outside, and I did want to talk to him for a moment, so I laid Angel on her bed and got to my task. I took out her PJs, and then carefully slipped the costume off her. Then I slipped her head and both arms through the nightgown, and finally I tucked her in.

Not too shabby. She didn't even wake up.

Her hair was a mess, but that was an ordeal I'd help her deal with in the morning. I put her costume in one of her drawers, I pulled off her shoes—which I'd forgotten about—and then I finally left the room.

Angel didn't look like she was having a nightmare. Good. I'd check later, anyway, just in case.

As I expected, Fang was waiting for me in the hall. I nearly bumped into him. I pulled a finger to my lips and guided him into the living room.

My defenses nearly crumbled right then, when my adrenaline shot down. Angel was safe, I was safe, Fang was safe… my guard shut down, and suddenly I felt very, very tired.

Fang must've noticed, because he took hold of my elbow. He didn't let go till I sat down. I said nothing.

"One of them had a gun," Fang told me. I jerked up a little. "He was the first one I took out. I thought you'd want to know."

I breathed. Okay. I nodded. "I'm… sorry. I stayed with Angel instead of helping you."

He quirked an eyebrow. "I would've hated you for leaving Angel if you helped."

I chuckled, but there was no humor in it. I studied him closely. There was something off about him… "You're hurt." It was true. A big, red blotch swelled on his face. Upon closer examination, I noticed another, turning purple on his forearm.

He shrugged. "It'll be gone in the morning."

I stood up. "It won't if you don't do something about it," I said. I took cloth and put some ice in it, then I handed it to him. "Hold this to your face."

He shrugged and did as I said.

I rummaged around the pantry for a first-aid kit, but found nothing. Then I checked in the main bathroom, Fang's bathroom. I'd never been in there before—it was exactly the same as mine: toilet, shower, sink. All in nice brown and yellow-ish hues.

I didn't find a first aid kit, per se, but the little cabinet above the sink was stocked. I took my best guess at the small assortment of creams and such, actually taking time to read the labels.

I returned to the living room. Fang stared at me while I looked at his arm. He stared at me while I uncapped the little cream tube. And he kept on staring at me while I put some on his arm, straight from the tube. "Rub that in," I told him. I set the tube beside him. "Do it again tomorrow morning."

He stared at me, then at the little dot of cream on his arm, and he chuckled. And then he laughed. "Thank-you, doc. Do I get a lollipop?"

I laughed. "Look for one in Angel's bucket. You even get to pick."

And that was when I remembered it—the first aid kit, resting at the bottom of my suitcase. _Just in case, _I'd thought. _Fang might need it—I'll probably make sure he needs it._ It felt so long ago. So many things had changed in just… what? Seven days? Wow.

Fang rolled his eyes at me, oblivious to my sudden trip down memory lane. He set the ice pack down, and he rubbed in the little dot of cream. I watched him the whole time, not really sure of what to do. He noticed me staring.

"I…" I said, awkwardly. If you hadn't noticed, I tend to do that a lot—fill in uncomfortable silences with the first thing that comes to mind. "I… thanks. For… just… being there."

He gave me a half-smile, the type that used to make me stand on my toes and bite my lip. I still bit my lip. I wasn't standing up. He was about to say something, but I didn't want to prolong this conversation. I was drifting into dangerous territory—we both were.

Then again, wasn't that what I'd pledged to stop doing—stop limiting myself? Clean slate, clean slate… I stood up. "Just… thanks. You're Angel's hero." We both knew there was a hidden meaning in there. I just wasn't the type to say that sort of thing aloud.

Now, let's freeze there for a second. We all know I tend to do stupid and impulsive things. I'm not quite sure whether what I did right then categorized in stupid, but it definitely merited a prize for impulsive.

I was about to leave, you see. I'd just mutter a quick 'goodnight' and walk all the way to Angel's room—to check if she was still sleeping okay. Then I'd go to my room, change, and sleep till very, very late. Easy.

But I fell into one of those trances right then, the type where it's more like you're watching yourself act, rather than acting it all out yourself. A surreal sort of experience.

Anyhow, my point is, instead of turning and leaving as planned, I bent down and kissed his cheek, just like that, without warning. Not my smartest move, but I didn't really regret it. I was mortified, naturally, but that's not quite the same thing as regret. I knew regret. It's not the same, and at the time, that wasn't it.

"Goodnight," I said. It was more of a whisper, really. But I was standing so close to him, and I knew he would've heard even if it'd only been a thought.

He sat there, immobile. I took that as my cue to leave. And I did leave, and I most certainly didn't turn around.

But that didn't stop me from hearing it: soft, slow, and very, very low. So low, I wouldn't have heard it, had it not been the dead of the night. And even then, I wouldn't have heard it, if my senses hadn't been on hyper alert. "Goodnight."

* * *

><p><strong>Edited: 11.25-27.2012. <strong>

* * *

><p><strong>AN: So much better. I'm proud.<strong>


	9. Birthday

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

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><p>Chapter 9<p>

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><p><em>Day 7 - Sunday - November 1 <em>

Surprise, surprise. I slept in yet again.

It was kind of funny, actually. I woke up and, after coming to my senses and realizing I was _not_ falling down a rabbit hole, I let my mind wander for a moment. I then realized exactly where I was, and what had happened _before_ I landed myself where I was (you know… nearly getting mugged, running back to the apartment, stuff that happened before I went to bed…) I freaked a little and thought about going back to sleep.

That was when I wondered how many hours I had to kill before someone came in to look for me. Imagine my surprise when I feel around my nightstand for my cell phone and… voila! I miraculously find out it's half past noon.

I didn't fall off the bed, mind you. I just… I hit my head on the wall. Deal with it.

While nursing my bruised head, I wondered where Fang and Angel were. Surely not still sleeping… maybe watching TV? Playing the pink game of doom?

After thinking on it for a while, I decided to wake up first, investigate later. So I took a shower and got dressed, and _then_ I stepped out of my room with a confused look on my face.

I didn't Fang nor Angel anywhere in the apartment (which, by the way, _did_ worry me a little), but I did find a rather attractive-looking stack of waffles waiting for me in the kitchen. I picked up my plate, and that was when I found the note, strategically located under my breakfast plate. Smart, Fang. Real smart.

After taking a bite out of my [cold] waffles, I picked up the note and read while I chewed:

_Max,_

_Angel wanted to go to the park. She woke me up at an ungodly hour of the morning, muttering something about the sunrise. I was sleepy and I got the Bambi eyes. We agreed to let you sleep, however—waking you up sounded dangerous._

_I don't know how long we'll be out, so if you're reading this, it must mean she wanted to stay or something. Meet up with us at the park once you're done eating—by the way, you have to place the plate in the microwave for about 30 seconds. (AKA, press the 3, then the 0, and then START._ _Call me if you have any doubts or if the microwave somehow blows up.)_

_See you at the park,_

_-Angel & Fang._

I rolled my eyes and set the note down. Then I looked down at my waffles. Cold waffles, or risking the microwave?

Wait a minute. Where _is _the microwave, anyway?

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I _did_ find the microwave, for those curious peeps out there. And I _didn't_ blow it up.

After I finished eating and brushed my teeth, I headed out to the park. On the way there, I got a text from J.J., something I found a little surreal. I hadn't heard from her—at all—in the entire week! My life away from the project felt kind of distant, not quite _mine_.

It was a strange feeling.

J.J.'s text read as follows:

_MAX!_

_HAPPY B-DAY 2 U! You're a hundred and two! I've missed you this we-eek, AAAAAND… I don't know what could rhyme with two. Ooh! This: And you've missed me too! I'm such a genius._

_Anyhow. How's everything? Hmm? Kill anyone yet? Thought about it?_

_Be nice, Max! I'll see you tomorrow—and I want to hear _everything_._

_-J.J._

For a moment I just stood there. I even checked the date on my phone. _Oh, yeah_, I thought. _Today's my birthday. _Again, surprise, surprise.

Grinning, I started to reply to the text when something occurred to me. _Tomorrow. I'll see you tomorrow._

My birthday. November 1. Sunday. Last day of the project. Last day with Angel.

I felt like someone had punched me in the gut. Talk about a birthday to remember.

After I clicked _Send_, I noticed I had another unread text, this one from Ella.

_Happy Birthday, Max! (Yes, today is your birthday. Yesterday was Halloween. It's been 365 days since you last forgot your birthday. Starting to remember? Yeah? Hurray!)_

_Have a great time today, alright? I'll kick Fang's butt if you report otherwise. Iggy called last night, by the way—he had some strange things to say… at least I know you're all still alive and kicking. But, Alice in Wonderland, Max? That sounds like a promising story._

_I'll see you tonight, okay? Have a great day!_

_Love, Ella._

_PS. Mom asks if you could call her whenever you get the change._

I typed a reply while walking to the park, thinking about Ella and Mom. They felt kind of foreign, too.

I arrived at the park a few moments after clicking _Send_ and, imagine my surprise, no one was there. I scanned the entire park closely, but it was completely abandoned. That was particularly strange—nearly one pm, Sunday… shouldn't the place be a little more crowded?

I sat down on a bench, taking my phone out. I figured calling Mom now wouldn't be a bad idea. Fang and Angel could wait, wherever they were.

A little voice in the back of my mind told me I should be worrying… if they weren't at the park, like they'd said they'd be…

I shrugged it off. Not likely.

The phone rang twice before Mom picked up. "Hello?"

I sat back into my bench. Hearing her voice was nice. "Hey, Mom."

"Max! Happy birthday! How has your day been?"

I pondered that. Yeah, how had my day been? Waffles, no Fang and no Angel, deserted park, 2 texts… "All good," I said simply. "Waffles made my day."

Mom chuckled. "I'm glad to know. How's Angel? Fang?"

"They're fine. We've had… well, we've had an interesting week so far. Angel's having fun."

"Hmm," Mom said. "And Fang?"

I bit my lip. "Saying ten words a day. The usual." Mom didn't say anything. "It's been… interesting. We haven't killed each other. And we seem to amuse Angel."

Mom took a moment to speak, but then she laughed a little. "Okay, sweetheart. I'll see you tonight, okay?"

"Yup."

"Good. Happy birthday, Max. Love you."

"Love you, too."

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

I ended up walking back to the apartment. For a few moments I considered calling Fang, but then ditched the idea. If he and Angel weren't at the apartment when I got back, I'd call.

Happy with that resolution, I started my way back. I thought about my mom while I walked. And about Ella and J.J. And, believe it or not, Jeb.

They were all part of my life. My… reality. Being pulled away from that reality for a full week really gave me some perspective on my life. Things felt kind of different now, though I wasn't sure how.

Angel had become my life in that sense, and so had Fang. Not in the sense that I depended on them or that they were all I had and cared about, but rather in the sense that they were what I saw every day, what I'd come to expect.

As of tomorrow, that would change again. But my question was: would things revert to the way they were eight, ten days ago? I didn't think so.

And so I wondered about that thing every human being thinks about at some (or many) point of his or her life: what happens next?

With these thoughts in mind, I reached the apartment door. When I opened it, I frowned. _I didn't pull the curtains this morning, did I?_

I found it amazing that just by pulling the curtains, the apartment became so dark that I couldn't see any further than the dining room.

Everything was still and silent. I flicked the light on, and then promptly stumbled back out the door, almost falling on my butt.

Why, you ask? I think the sound waves pushed me backwards.

"SURPRISE!"

Wait, that's not all of it. "FANG!" _that _was definitely Angel. "You were supposed to yell surprise!"

It took me a minute to realize that it wasn't _two_ voices that greeted me, but rather… eight? Ten?

I blinked up at the faces staring down at me. The light had come a bit harsh to my eyes. "Umm… I'm surprised."

A general wave of laughter spread around. Ella walked out of the bunch and hugged me. "Happy birthday, sis."

"Thanks," I said, hugging her back. "How did this… err… thing, happen?"

Ella pulled back and winked at me. "You'd be surprised."

"I kind of already am," I said. I knew that look of hers. She wasn't going to say a word.

Ella raised an eyebrow. She turned to the crowd of nine people (I took the moment to count). "The great Maximum Martinez is actually surprised! I thought it'd take more than this, guys. Talk about a waste of effort."

While more laughter ensued, Angel ran out from the crowd as well. She hugged my legs. "Feliz cumpleaños, Max," she said with a wink.

I grinned down at her, a brief question mark popping into my head. "Gracias."

That was when I felt it. It came quick and sharp, expanding slowly through me as my mind registered it. That smell. My eyes went wide and I felt my mouth begin to water. "Cookies!"

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

After Ella handed me a Tupperware with my name on it, filled with Mom's homemade cookies, we split up and sat down. I mean split up in the sense that Angel went off to her room with Hayley (who, Fang told me, got permission to come after Fang went through a phone call with Lissa—I didn't ask for the details) and Emily, Sam and Rebecca's seven-year-old kid.

When I thought of that last bit, it sounded weird. Beyond weird.

The rest of us consisted of Ella, J.J., Iggy, Sam, Rebecca, Fang, and I. We sat down at the living room and talked for a while. Sam and Rebecca compared project experiences with Fang and I (that topic died down quickly, as you can imagine). Then Iggy, Ella, and J.J. talked about how weird their weeks had been without yours truly (and Fang). And Ella and Rebecca bonded and they started a whole other conversation I was by no means part of. Sam and J.J., my two best buddies, caught up on whatever it is they talked about when I'm not there.

As for me? Well, I challenged Iggy to a Mario Bros. Wii match. Fang tagged along.

_I_ won the Wii match (Fang didn't win, no matter what he may tell you—Iggy dropped out halfway through, the sissy), FYI.

After _I _ won the Wii match, Chinese food miraculously appeared at my front door. Angel, Hayley, and Emily left to eat in Angel's room, but I did notice that they took one of the four fortune cookies.

Hmph. Fine.

While I happily ate my Chinese food, the conversation I'd been dreading the whole time came up. I'd been having a rather pleasant conversation with Sam on how we'd join the Home Eco. group and do a collective prank on Henderson when…

"So, Max." J.J. was the little sneak that brought it up. I turned to look at her, and the conversations around us hushed. "How have you and Fang _not_ killed each other all week?"

I almost felt the words echoing off the walls. It was a fairly simple question, really, it shouldn't have bothered me. I tried to shrug. "Miracles happen."

"Hmm," J.J. said. She continued eating as she "thought", ignoring the five pairs of eyes trained on her. "If you say so."

The entire table breathed.

For a moment I was mad—why did that have such an effect on everyone? On me? I turned to look at Fang. He was staring down at his food, fork in hand. He looked up briefly and his gaze did meet mine, but then he looked back down.

Our entire exchange lasted less than two seconds, but I had a feeling that everyone had noticed. And I wanted to kill J.J.

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

My birthday 'cake' consisted of a giant chocolate chip cookie with a candle stuck in the middle. Best cake ever.

After I waited in agony for everyone to finish singing 'Happy Birthday' (I wanted my cookie) and everyone got a piece of my mega-cookie, we all sat down at the living room to get my presents. And… I didn't see any presents.

"You have to look for them," Ella explained.

I was so close, so close to taking another bite out of my cookie, and Ella had to interrupt me. "Huh?"

"Think of it as a scavenger hunt," she said. "Each of us hid your gift someplace in the apartment. Each wrote you a clue"—she handed me a bunch of index cards—"based on something that connects you to us. You'll see."

I took that bite out of my cookie, raising my eyebrows. I flipped through the index cards, taking in the variety of messy scrawls and, of course, Ella's ever perfect cursive.

"You must find this funny somehow," I told Ella. "Hilarious."

She just smiled.

Rolling my eyes, I finished the last of my cookie. Then I plucked out a card from the very center of the bunch—Ella's.

"Read it aloud," Sam said.

I nodded. "Ella," I said. I showed the side of the card with Ella's neat cursive name on it, waving it around for everyone to see.

Ella rolled her eyes. "Go on, then."

I cleared my throat and sat up straight. Ella laughed at me, but I continued on and read the card with an accent and everything, trying to sound official… ish. "I forced you to pack it, but I don't know why I even bothered. Did you even use it?" I laughed. "No, sister dearest, I didn't use it."

Ella rolled her eyes. "Go get it, then."

I retrieved the makeup kit from its lone spot at the bottom of my suitcase, and walked back into the living room.

"What's that?" Sam asked while I unzipped the bag.

"Makeup kit," I said. He, along with every other person in the room laughed. "Ha, ha," I said. "Very funny."

Inside the makeup kit, however, I found no makeup. Two boxes met my eyes instead. I pulled the smaller one out, which had a note in my mother's handwriting attached.

"I took the makeup with me in the morning," Ella said. "The small one is from Mom and Dad."

I opened the note: _Happy birthday, sweetheart. Love, Mom and Jeb._

At least she signed it _Jeb _and not _Dad_… Inside the box were some tiny, prickly things I classified as earrings. They were cute, I figured. A little red thing (a ruby, probably) surrounded by what looked to be teeny tiny diamonds.

"Wow," I said, staring at them. "I might actually use them."

Ella snorted. "Mom will be pleased, then. Open the other box."

I stored the earrings back into their box, and I pulled out the other one. This one was thin, but bigger. I pulled a CD case out, inside of which was a CD with the funniest cartoon mariachis staring up at me. "Nice cover," I said. "What is this?"

"That's my present, actually," Ella said. She just laughed at me—she'd done that quite a lot that day. "I took all your favorites and burned them into the CD. Nudge's dad helped me print the picture onto it."

I grinned. "Thank-you, sister dearest. Your makeup scheme has been redeemed."

Ella laughed, yet again. "Thank-you, sister dearest. C'mon, next card."

I pulled another card out at random . "Sam," I read. "Note to self: Never work on Science projects with Max." I looked up at Sam, who was holding in laughter. "Wha—Oh…" I glared at him. "That was your fault!"

I pulled a (cold) box wrapped in purple paper out of the fridge. "Once upon a time," I told the curious crowd staring at the box, "Sam and I were working on a science project at my house. My brain was fried after two hours of staring at a textbook, so I suggested ice cream. After I served it, Sam said ice cream just wasn't ice cream without whipped cream. So he pulled some out of the fridge, but it wouldn't budge." I started to unwrap the box. "Sam fiddled with the cap for a while, but nothing came out. In the end, the bottle blew up and Sam ended up covered. His textbook too—he had to buy another one later." I laughed. "Ah, good times."

While everyone laughed and pointed at Sam, who was glaring at me, I opened the box. Inside was a leather jacket and, surprise, a bottle of whipped cream. "Aw, thanks Sam. I'm pretty sure you rigged the bottle, though, so I'm just going to store that one away for now."

Sam laughed. "Rebecca picked the jacket, so technically it's from both of us."

I decided I liked Rebecca's taste. "Thanks guys," I said, setting the jacket and the bottle on the table. "Next up"—I pulled another card out of the bunch—"Iggy." He cracked a smile. "Didn't really know what to write here so… it's in the bathroom."

"That's not fair!" Ella said. "Iggy!"

He just laughed and ducked when Ella swatted a hand at him.

I figured he meant Fang's bathroom, because I doubted he'd actually stepped into my room to look for mine. After I found a cardboard box inside, I sat back down on my spot with the box in my lap. It felt heavy—never a good thing around Iggy.

I cracked one of the box flaps open, then I looked up. "Iggy, nothing in here is life-threatening correct? No snakes or nuclear bombs or exploding paint bombs, yes?"

Iggy laughed. "I wouldn't kill you—not on your birthday."

I rolled my eyes. "How reassuring." I opened the box, and heard a loud _click_. I looked up and glared at Iggy just in time before a smelly green gas shot out of the box, clouding the space around me. I coughed and covered my nose, dropping the box to the floor. "Iggy!" I called out in the midst of coughs and grunts. "You're a dead man!"

The gas cleared up easily after I opened a couple windows. Iggy looked sheepish, standing at the other end of the room. "You didn't say anything about stink-bombs."

I glared. I smelled my hands, then my hair. "You are so lucky I'm neither green nor smelly."

He snorted. "As if I didn't know the risks."

After glaring some more at Iggy and sitting back down, I picked up the box once more. I chose to overlook the complex contraption inside and the popped remains of a balloon, instead focusing on the CD.

_Ooh, he's good_, I thought. I'd been hoping to get my hands on the new All Time Low CD, but it'd been sold out everywhere I looked. "Thanks, Ig. You won't die today."

He visibly relaxed. "You're welcome."

I set the box aside and placed the CD on the table, moving on to the next card. Angel's messy scrawl met my eyes. "Angel," I said. I turned the card over to find Fang's chicken scratch, which wasn't much of an improvement from Angel's.

"Le dije a Fang que lo escribiera por mi—con mi letra no cabía."

I nodded at her. "Okay, then." I could believe that her handwriting couldn't fit the clue into such a small card. "Let's see… I had a nightmare a few days ago, so you gave me food. What did you give me?"

I thought back to that night. I'd given her cookies, right? Yeah, that was it. I walked to the pantry where, sure enough, I found a piece of paper on top of the cookie box. I closed the pantry and walked back, studying the page.

It was from her coloring book; a picture of a birthday cake with the words _Happy Birthday Max! _written on top of it. The other side read, in Spanish:

_Happy Birthday Max!_

_Thank-you for an awesome week! I loved spending time with you and Fang, and I'll miss you lots! _

_I hope you like the picture, it's from the coloring book you got me at the mall, remember? I had fun that day._

_Love, Angel._

_PS. I wasn't supposed to tell, but the party was Fang's idea. Can you think about forgiving him? Pretty please?_

I finished reading and smiled. Besides the spelling errors, of course, that was the nicest card anyone had ever given me. I hugged Angel. "Thank-you," I whispered. "I love it."

Angel grinned up at me. "Really?"

I nodded. "Yep. I'll hang it up in my room back at home."

"Ooh, promise?"

"Promise."

I set the drawing on the table, letting everyone coo at Angel for a minute before picking up the next card. "J.J.," I read. "You obviously weren't going to replace it on your own, so I got you a new one. It's on the usual spot."

It took me a full minute to figure that one out, but once I did, I was laughing. "You didn't."

"I most certainly did," J.J. said.

To my disgust, she'd wrapped the box in pink paper, but the saying says that _what's on the inside is what counts_, so I ignored that and opened the box. Inside, I found a brand new alarm clock.

"If you plug your iPod in, it'll wake you up with music instead of that annoying _beep_," J.J. said.

I grinned. "Thanks."

She nodded. "Figured you'd like it."

I took the last card. "Fang," I read. Everyone fell unnaturally silent. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him staring at me—I felt him staring at me. I cleared my throat and turned it over. It was blank except for one word: _Lamp._

I frowned. He'd given me a lamp? I remembered I'd told him I thought the one in the dining room was cool, but… I fingered the card, thinking. I noticed it was crinkled.

Crinkled. Lamp.

"_So," I said, "you're supposed to write on it with this… mixture thing?"_

_Fang laughed. "Yeah, then you need to wait for it to dry, so stop eyeing the lamp. It needs to get all crinkly and stuff before you try to see the message."_

_I rolled my eyes. "Fine. I'll find out what you wrote in a few minutes—so why can't you tell me now?"_

_Fang continued laughing. "Well, why can't you wait a few minutes?"_

_I sat back into his couch, crossing my arms. "Fine. Party pooper."_

"_Ditto," he grinned. "Anyhow, I think you can try now."_

_I rushed to his living room lamp, ignoring his chuckle in the background. I waited as patient as I'd ever been for the card to heat up, and grinned when the letters started to appear. "It's working!"_

_He said nothing, so I kept on waiting for the message to appear. The letters appeared at random intervals, each more illegible than the other. "Your handwriting sucks, you know," I told him. I could make out the first few words by then: I think._

"_Let's see," I mumbled, peering closely to the card. "I think… Geez, Fang, how hard did you try while writing this down?" I pulled the card away from the lamp and looked at it more closely. "I think I…" I faltered. _

_I think I love you._

He'd kissed me that day. I remembered it. I'd frozen up after reading the note, and when I finally turned around, he was right there, two inches behind me. He was great at that—stalking up to me in silence. He'd looked at me for a while, and then he'd kissed me, and I'd kissed back.

That day had messed everything up.

I shook my head. I walked over to the dining room lamp, feeling all eyes on me as I held the card up to it. I waited very patiently, just like I'd done that one time. The letters appeared faster than they had last time, and his chicken scratch was considerably more legible, too.

_Like this card, you're the only one that can read me. I'm sorry I blew it so many times._

_Bubbles._

Bubbles, bubbles… kitchen. I walked to the kitchen sink where, effectively, I noticed a small black box. I opened it there, away from the curious prying eyes.

I took out a carefully folded note, written in normal ink for a change. _This made me think of you, I'm not sure why. Happy birthday._

I set the note aside, pulling a necklace out of the box. It was a simple silver chain with a pendant about the size of my thumb. The pendant depicted a pair of black and white wings.

I sat back down, storing both notes back inside the box. "Thank-you," I said simply, pulling the necklace on. Everyone was staring, and the silence dragged on for about ten seconds before I finally broke it: "So, any cookies left?"

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

The party ended about two hours later, once everyone had left and the apartment had been sort of cleaned. Ella left last, having stayed to help clean up the rest of our mess, and then she'd taken Hayley back to Lissa's apartment for Fang.

Angel, Fang, and I sat on the living room couch, admiring our handiwork. You couldn't even tell that Iggy had spilled coke on the floor.

"Thanks guys," I said. "I had a great time."

"You're welcome, Max," Angel said. Fang nodded. "I have to go look for something, okay?"

I nodded, and off she went, leaving Fang and me alone. I fiddled with my necklace, unsure of what to say. "Thanks, really," I told Fang. "It's pretty."

I mentally asked myself when I'd last said the word _pretty_.

He seemed to notice where my train of thought was going. "You're welcome."

"Using invisible ink was… creative. You really made me think."

He chuckled. It sounded a lot like the one I'd heard in my head a while ago. "I noticed." Again, silence. Then: "That day was kind of a while ago, wasn't it?"

I nodded. "Nearly three months."

He nodded. "Feels like three years."

Silence set in again, and this time I felt like I had to break it. Except I didn't know what to say. "Long time," I said simply. Stupidly.

Fang made a noise that resembled a sigh. "I messed up that day, right?"

I blinked. I knew that was coming. "No, not that day."

He sat up. "Then… when?"

I bit my lip. He said he didn't know… okay, then. Indulge him. "The week after."

"Exactly?" he asked. I nodded. "The Friday after… you still weren't talking to me. I tried to talk to you on Monday and on Thursday, not Friday."

"I know. You didn't say anything at all on Friday."

I felt his temper rising a little. "So that's what I did? I didn't try again on Friday? Because I tried the whole weekend after that, if you remember."

"No," I said. "It's not that."

"Then, what?" He breathed, leveling his tone. "Help me out here. Please."

I swallowed. _Okay_. "I saw you on Friday, right before Chemistry. I wanted to talk to you."

He frowned. "You did? I didn't see you. Ella told me you felt sick when I looked for you that afternoon. In fact… you weren't in Chemistry that day."

"I know that," I said. "I left before Chemistry started. Right after I saw you, actually."

He nodded. "Chemistry… what time… oh."

I sighed. "Oh, indeed."

"Oh… no. No,no, no!. Ella told me you were sick! I didn't see you all day, I thought…" He pinched the bridge of his nose. "All this time, I never even thought you'd seen that because I thought you hadn't stepped into school the whole time!"

I rolled my eyes. "Does it even matter? You still did it, and you still would've done it."

"But I would've known!" He turned to look at me. "All this time, I've retraced my steps from the week before, and that week, and the week after! And all this time I discarded that one slip, that one moment before Chemistry, because I thought it impossible that you would've seen! And I even considered that someone had told you, which is why I tried to explain that weekend, but you only screamed that you'd seen me _with your own eyes_!"

"Again, that still doesn't matter because you still did it!"

He exhaled loudly. "I did. And I regretted it the moment she let me go, and I even pushed her to one side and screamed at her in front of the entire student body, or what was left of it out in the hall at that hour. But I bet no one told you that part, right? Because you were sick that day and you supposedly didn't see a thing!"

I kept silent. No one had said anything about that.

"But I bet Ella knew, didn't she? You told her everything. And Iggy probably knew, too. And none of them ever told me that you'd seen!"

"But that still doesn't matter, Fang!" I groaned. "Fang, you kissed Lissa out of your own volition, and even if you didn't, you didn't push her off for the three minutes I stood there, watching. I waited for you to push her off and I waited for you to yell at her, and you know what? The bell rang and you were still there. And I looked back even after running all the way down the hall, and you were still there."

"I was," he said. "And I am sorry about that, Max. But guess what? I wasn't thinking straight, and I hadn't been thinking straight for the whole week. You know why, Max? Because you ran out on me. A week prior, I told you I might love you, and I kissed you. And you kissed me back, and for a moment I thought you felt something too. But no, you ran out on me, and then refused to talk to me for that week, and the week after, and for the past two months and a half!"

"And yet you still kissed Lissa," I spat at him. "And you did it again two days ago, so what do you have to say about that?"

"But I kissed you first, didn't I? And I didn't push you away, did I? I didn't scream at you and I didn't knock you to the ground. Hell, Max, what do you want me to say? That week I was angry at you, I was angry at myself. I exposed myself to you and what did I get in turn? You left me in ridicule, and you didn't even say sorry. If you'd said that you didn't feel that way in the first place I would've understood, but you decided to leave me to figure it out on my own.

"And then that Friday when I kissed Lissa, I didn't do it out of my own volition. She kissed me and I did try to push her off, but she just held onto me, so I stopped struggling. You know why I stopped struggling, Max? Partially because I wanted a girl to kiss me without running out on me afterwards. But, partially, I wanted you to walk by, because I _knew_ you had Chemistry at that hour, and I wanted you to tear her away from me and scream. I wanted you to show that you cared, even just a little. But you didn't.

"And when Ella said that you'd been sick, I felt relieved. On one side, because I was glad you hadn't seen the stupidest thing I'd done in my life. On another, because that meant that you hadn't just walked by and shrugged it off. Or that you'd just thought '_Oh, good for him!' _and walked into class. But even then, you still refused to talk to me, Max, and damn it all, I was mad at you."

He was breathing heavily by the time he finished. "I'm sorry," he said. "I messed up and I'm sorry. But, for what it's worth, tell me you at least understand it now. Tell me that you understand I had no ill intentions." He swallowed. "Please."

I felt myself nod. "Yeah," I said. I'd never heard my voice sound that way. "Okay."

We sat there in silence for several minutes. Too many thoughts raced through my mind, and yet, now that I think about it, I can't remember a single one. He stood up right then. "Thank-you," he said. He took maybe three steps before he stopped, but then he started walking again.

He kept on walking, and each step reverberated through my ears. I heard each one echo in my mind. Every single one.

I stood up right then. I felt a lot like the previous night, acting in a bit of a trance. This time, however, I broke it before I did anything. I just stood there for a minute. Again, I'm not sure what went through my mind right then.

Then, however, I started walking too. And my steps echoed just as loudly as his came to a stop. I didn't think it through. Even when I was standing an inch away from him, staring up at his eyes, I still wasn't sure what I was trying to do.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. I felt a weight, a nearly three-month-old weight, lift from my shoulders. I touched the fabric of his sleeve, trailing my fingers up to his shoulder. "I'm sorry."

I closed my eyes and pursed my lips. "I was stupid, and I wasn't thinking straight. And I was… jealous. And I was scared."

He fiddled with a strand of my hair, but let me continue talking. "Jeb left my mom. And me, and Ella. You know the story. I just… I wanted to make sure you didn't leave me. So I… I left you first." I rested my fingers flat on his shoulder. "I never told anyone that. I'm sorry."

He let go of my hair. I stood there, feeling weak and vulnerable and stupid. I felt as if he was going to burst out laughing at any moment. Or call me a freak. A stupid, insecure freak.

Or that he'd flat-out reject me.

He didn't, though. Instead, he placed two fingers on my chin, then used another two to lightly pull my eyelids open. He stared at me, straight into my eyes, and he kept coming closer and closer. By the time I could feel his breath on my lips, he stopped. He looked at me in the eyes, then down to my lips, and then back at my eyes.

And then I got tired of his teasing and I closed the gap.

His reaction was instant, his arms tightening their grip on my waist. He kissed me very slowly, sort of like how he'd done it last time. One of his hands found its way to my cheek and stayed there; his thumb tracing trails over it, across my forehead and my eyes.

I fingered his hair. It was softer than I remembered it, and it felt silkier than my own. He had some hidden curls at the nape of his neck, which I'd never noticed.

He started to pull back from me, slowly. I buried my nose in the crook of his neck. Briefly, I remembered what I'd been thinking about much earlier, how my perspective on my life—my reality—had changed. As I pondered that, the weight of everything that had just happened settled onto me, and I was happy about it.

I'd changed my reality in that brief moment, just as I'd changed it throughout the week. And I'd done it out of my own choice.

As I smiled to myself at the realization, I heard a faint _click_ behind me. I looked up at Fang, whose eyes were twinkling in a way I'd forgotten they could manage. He gestured for me to turn around.

I stood up straight and did as he said. My gaze met Angel, who was standing at the end of the hall, clutching a camera in her hands. She smiled sheepishly at me, and waved the camera. "Found it!"

_P-R-O-J-E-C-T : F-A-M-I-L-Y_

Fang and I took Angel back to the orphanage an hour after Angel took the picture. In that moment, I'd completely forgotten about it. In fact, I'd forgotten about it all day until ten, when Mrs. Keith had called, asking if we would please take Angel back before eleven, because they wanted to start closing up and calling lights out.

We all let a few tears out, even Fang. We both promised Angel to visit her at least every other day. She looked so sad.

I think both Fang and I knew it, I think even Angel knew it. No matter for how long we visited Angel, there would come a time when our visits would just be… rare. Sometimes sorts of things. Or Angel would get adopted.

In my mind, I firmly promised myself to never forget Angel. To never forget my week.

I'd once more changed my reality, and I was about to start feeling just how real change could be.

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><p><strong>Edited: 8.31.2012<strong>

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><p><strong>AN: I am so proud of myself for this edit. Perhaps a little overdone at the ending, but still. The previous one made me want to curl up and die. And the last scene gave the story a certain feel I liked. Bittersweet, not quite so fluffy and simple.<strong>


	10. Epilogue

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything James Patterson owns, nor any brand/place you recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

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><p>Epilogue<p>

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><p><em>Monday – November 23<em>

Mondays equal dull days: a personal law of life that followed me all the way through my teenage years. Good times, good times…

That particular Monday morning turned out to be no exception to the rule. Had a test, some of my worst classes piled up in a single day, plenty of homework awaiting me… blah. No, the interesting part of that Monday, the part that, effectively, _was_ the exception to the rule, came in the afternoon.

Fang drove me home that Monday—the plan was to do homework for a couple hours, as per usual, and then leave to visit Angel at the orphanage sometime around seven pm. We'd been following that routine every other day ever since the project ended.

I won't lie—it was beginning to weigh on us.

Visiting Angel took up time—we always planned one hour and stayed for at least two or three—and it mentally exhausted us both. We missed her. We needed her.

The worst part, I think, was knowing that she'd be adopted someday. Especially now, seeing as she'd started speaking English in public again. Fang and I couldn't bear the thought of her leaving—unfair and selfish, I know, but the truth is that we just wanted her for ourselves—even though we had no power whatsoever over that.

Mom had been the first to notice our… moods, let's call them, followed by Ella and Iggy, then J.J. and probably Jeb too. Anne and Gazzy might've noticed something at Fang's house, too. Anyhow, they all gave me and Fang space, never mind the funny looks we occasionally received.

And it wasn't only us like that. Sam and Rebecca were also down most of the time—Fang and I sometimes bumped into them at the orphanage while they visited Emily. Henderson noticed that most of his students were looking pretty down as well.

That got me thinking on something: would the project be cancelled next year? The "side effects", let's call them, clearly weren't planned. So… what? Would they risk it again? Sure, the major advantage was that plenty of kids got adopted in the following months—but not all of them, and it was somewhat bittersweet for a few of my classmates.

Let's think Sam and Rebecca; a clear example of the former situation. Sam had told me a week prior to this particular Monday that he'd been talking to his dad about adopting Emily. He had no siblings, after all, and Rebecca had agreed that it'd be best if Emily stayed with him (Rebecca had three siblings, so adding another into the mix wouldn't be quite fair to her family, or so Sam explained). Although on that particular Monday I didn't know it, Sam's family did end up adopting Emily a couple weeks later.

As an example to the latter situation, we can take Lissa and Dylan. Hayley was fed up with them—she told me so herself, seeing as I usually talked with her for a while when Fang and I visited Angel—and neither had visited. Hayley was perfectly content with that.

As for Lissa and Dylan… as far as I'd noticed, they avoided each other like the plague. Interesting.

Anyhow. Nearly half of Henderson's class ended up adopting a kid from the orphanage—by the time of that Monday, about six adoptions had gone through. I felt kind of… jealous. Fang and I had discussed adoption, but hadn't said a word to Angel. It was a complicated subject—of course we both wanted her as a sister. Picking one of us would be a toughie. And it might've been best to ask Angel to pick, but we both knew that putting her in a compromising position like that would be unfair.

That was the general problem that had nagged at us during the past three weeks. Besides that, though, things were… great.

To state the obvious, Fang and I _did_, in fact, start dating after the program. And I did shove it into Lissa's face (just once, mind you, but boy did that feel good). Also, Fang started to speak a little more (he averaged little over a hundred words a day now, not ten). He also learned the concept of showing emotion (to me, at least. Iggy joked that he showed a bit too much. He still has the bruises for that little comment…).

He still didn't make noise while walking, though, and he still crept up to me at every available chance. That turned out to be more often than not. Sigh.

Sam and Rebecca started dating as well. Also, Sam and J.J. officially reconciled with Fang, meaning that our old group was back together. Rebecca joined as well, with a couple friends of hers tagging along.

My social life was, according to Ella, starting to look up.

Also, Fang and I finally found out how the grading thing worked with the project: Henderson explained that the grades were based on interviews with the kids. Fang and I got an A+; we seriously thanked Angel for that. She'd just rolled her eyes at us.

Our week in that apartment changed us all, in my opinion. Me, Fang, Angel, Sam, Rebecca, Hayley, Emily… even Ella and Iggy and J.J.—even Lissa and Dylan to some extent. We all altered our realities a little.

Speaking of alterations, my room wall now displayed Angel's drawing, framed and all. Beneath it sat my jumbo-sized teddy bear. The picture Angel took of me and Fang on the last day was safely stowed away in a top-secret place in my room.

As if I'll tell you where—what if Ella gets her hands on this?! On the picture? I'll never forgive myself!

I put my earring holes to use for some time—I really did like the earrings Mom gave me. However, everyone reached a mutual agreement that they made me look a bit too different (read: weird), so I put them away for special occasions. I did, however, use Fang's necklace every day.

Speaking of Fang, one last development I should mention: I did confront him about his blog, and I did confess to reading those two posts. He blew up for about ten seconds and then rolled his eyes. "Somehow, that doesn't surprise me at all," he'd said.

I sort of compensated by telling him that, in a way, his posts pushed me to forgive him. He accepted that and said nothing more of the situation.

I also found out that, apparently, Ella had also found his blog (which was what her frantic phone call had been all about). That coincidence was plain creepy, and I decided not to ponder it any further.

Anyhow. When I confronted Fang about his blog, he confessed something I should probably mention here as well. See, the reason why he was so freaked out about the orphanage on the day we met Angel, and the reason why he didn't look at all like Iggy or Gazzy (you know, his 'siblings') is because he's adopted.

His name isn't even Fang, actually, it's Nicholas (hence the blog pseudonym). His birth certificate, which was slightly changed up when Anne adopted him at age six, says his name is Nicholas Fang Ride. He just goes by Fang.

I think we can all say: _Oh… I get it._

So where did the name _Fang_ come from, anyway? Apparently, unlike most little kids, his first teeth to pop out were his "fangs", which earned him a bit of a reputation at the orphanage. He also used those two pointy teeth of his for certain… err… mischief. Consequently, his official nickname at the orphanage became Fang. When Anne adopted him, Fang wouldn't respond to the name 'Nicholas', so Anne had a few changes made to his papers.

There, all done. Phew. Now that we've cleared all that up, let's move onto why I'm talking about this particular Monday.

As I said _much_ earlier, Fang drove me home. We were silent during the ride—the comfortable kind of silence I could now share with him. Even though we were both worried sick about everything that had to do with Angel, we were okay knowing that, at least, we were in the situation together. And I won't be repeating that rather uncharacteristic mush, so shut up you teasers. Angel made me go soft—deal with it and move on.

Upon stepping into my house, we were greeted by Ella, whose butt was comfortably plopped onto the living room couch. She had a bag of chocolate-covered somethings in one hand, the TV remote in the other.

"Shouldn't you be doing homework or something?" I asked her, slipping my keys into my pocket.

Ella jumped a little. "Shouldn't you make noise when you open the door?" She turned to glare at me, then at Fang. "You've contaminated my sister."

Fang tipped his head a little. "I'll take that as a compliment."

I laughed and shut the door behind me. "Whatever. Listen, we'll be upstairs, okay?"

"Yeah, sure," Ella said. She sighed dramatically and made a face as she said: "As ordered by my dear mother, I must say the following: no funny business, the door stays open at all times, Fang has to be gone by ten, and you'd better get your homework done, young lady." She rolled her eyes and laughed. Then: "Oh, by the way, Jeb asked if you could see him in his study, just for a minute."

I furrowed my brow. "Did he say why?"

Ella turned back to the TV. "Yes, but that's not my secret to tell, now is it?"

I rolled my eyes. "Here," I said, giving my bag to Fang. "Just give me a minute. Watch TV with Ella or something."

Fang made a mock salute. "Yes, ma'am."

"Ha, ha," I said. I walked past him and Ella, down the hall and into Jeb's study. I knocked on the door twice, then heard his typical 'come in'. I opened the door and walked inside. I'd always felt a bit intimidated by Jeb's study—floor-to-ceiling windows covered one of the side walls, through which filtered enough light to make Jeb (and his desk, and his bookshelves, and just about everything in between) look kind of glowy and ghastly and… freaky.

I thought it suited him a bit. "Ella said you wanted to speak to me…?" I trailed off, my statement coming out as a question.

Jeb looked up from his laptop. "Hello, Max." He stood up. "Come with me," he said, gesturing to the hallway.

I furrowed my brow. "Right-o…"

He led me back into the living room, where Fang and Ella were still staring at the TV. Then Jeb gestured for me to walk upstairs, to which I shrugged at Fang, who was giving me a questioning look. Jeb then led me down the hall and towards the "storage room" (formerly an empty and dusty bedroom). He'd been remodeling it or something as of late—finally getting to the task of sorting through all our junk and either throwing it out or moving it to the attic (you know, its rightful spot to begin with…). Both Ella and I had restricted access—I wasn't particularly tempted to enter, as you may imagine, so his continued work on the storage room was pretty much a mystery to me.

Until that day, it'd been a rather uninteresting mystery, hence: "The storage room," I said. "Interesting."

Jeb laughed. "This is a late birthday present," he said. "I know things have always been tense between you and me, Maximum. I understand why you resent me, and I won't press you to forgive me. However, I want you to understand that I _am_ genuinely sorry." He averted his gaze. "I made some mistakes in the past, Max… mistakes I don't want you to know about just yet. I guess I want to make sure you understand that I've changed before I… how can I put this? _Dump_ it all on you and Ella. Hence, well, this."

I crossed my arms. "So you're trying to buy me over? I think we cleared this up during the first week, remember?" I raised a finger. "And I quote myself from about five months ago: not gonna work, buddy."

Jeb gave me a sad smile. "I'm not trying to buy you, Maximum. I am merely trying a different approach—actions instead of words, if you will."

I sighed. "Well, go on."

He gave me one last look before turning the knob and opening the door. For a moment my eyes burned a little—the entire room was _pink_, not at all the drab gray it'd been a couple weeks ago.

I stared. Briefly (as in, for the duration of about half a millisecond), I thought: _Jeb does not know me at all… _Then I was about to somewhat voice my thoughts ("What the—") when…

"MAX!"

My eyes bulged as I did a double-take. "A-Angel?"

Sure enough, there she was, standing in the middle of the storage room (or what used to be the storage room), wearing the angel costume Fang and I had bought for her two weeks back. She ran to me and clung to my legs tightly. "Max! Do you like my new room?"

I swallowed. "Your… new… room?"

"I knew you missed her," Jeb said. "Your mother and I agreed that this house is too big for just the four of us."

I felt my eyes sting a little, and a knot formed in my throat. "This… you… you _adopted_ her?"

Jeb nodded.

Angel released my legs, looking up at me with the adoring smile I'd come to love. I looked from her to the pink room a few times and then back at Jeb. "This… was your idea?"

Jeb hesitated. "Ella and your mother had some input with the room."

I blinked back a few tears. "I… thank-you." I hesitated for a moment, but then tentatively hugged Jeb. "Thank-you."

He took a moment to react, but then his arms slowly wrapped around me. "You're welcome."

I let go of him, a bit abruptly if you must know, feeling a bit strange at the contact. Not quite disgusted, just… strange. Foreign. Different.

He gave me a tentative smile. "I'm sure you two have a lot to catch up on," he said. With a final nod at both me and Angel, he walked back down the hall and then turned, until his figure disappeared down the stairs.

I kneeled down to Angel's height and hugged her. "Show me around your room?"

Angel nodded, still grinning wide. "Ella helped me decorate it. She visited me at the orphanage on the days you and Fang weren't there and she asked me what I wanted! She's so nice!"

I smiled. "Sure she is…"

"And look!" She pointed at the table in front of her bed, atop which sat a small TV. Beneath it were two shelves with multi-colored boxes, one of which was familiarly pink…

I looked further down and my eyes met a Wii. A _pink_ Wii. I didn't even know those existed!

"Oh, wow," I said. "I guess you'll have some fun afternoons with Fang up here."

"She probably will."

I tensed, clenching my fists. Fang chuckled behind me, his breath on my neck. I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment. "Don't—do—that!"

He took my hand and spun me around to face him. "What? Breathing?" He looked around the room, taking in the pink walls, the white furniture (with pink trimmings), the pink bed, the pink windowsills... Fang made a face. "Wow, this is…"

"Pink?" I suggested.

"Essentially, yes." He grinned down at me. "Ella told me all about it. This is huge."

I bit my lip, something rather uncharacteristic on my part. "You're not… mad, are you? I mean, I know we talked about who should get to adopt her, if either ever did, and…"

He cut me off. "I think this is for the best, and I'm actually pretty okay with it. I think Angel will be better off with you and Ella than with me, Iggy, and Gazzy. Especially Gazzy, now that I think about it." He played with a strand of my hair. "Don't worry about that."

I smiled and placed a kiss on his cheek. "Thanks."

"Ooh, Max! Fang! Guess what!"

I turned to look at Angel, who was busy looking out her window. "What is it?"

Angel pointed to something outside her window. "I almost forgot to tell you—your neighbors are going to adopt Hayley!"

I raised my eyebrows. Too many freaky coincidences… must not think about it or head shall explode… "Huh?"

Angel nodded. "When Jeb picked me up in the morning, your neighbors were there. Hayley was out there with me, saying goodbye. Jeb stopped to talk a little with the neighbors, and he introduced us to them. The neighbors liked Hayley lots, and now they want to adopt her!"

I gaped. "That's… great! Wow, that's… wow. That's pretty remarkable." _And an 11 on the 1-10 creepy coincidence scale…_

Angel nodded, then frowned. "What's remarkable mean?"

I laughed. Six-year-old. Right. "Amazing," I told her. "It means amazing."

"Oh," Angel said. "Well, it is!"

Fang's arms circled my waist. He placed his head in the crook of my neck and he whispered into my ear: "It is."

Angel giggled, looking up at us both with that sweet gaze of hers. "I'm going to change, okay?" She fingered her angel costume. "I wore it to surprise you."

I nodded. "Go ahead."

Once Angel was gone (and after some part of my head wondered if a walk-in closet was too much for a little kid like her), I turned to look at Fang. "You know," I told him, "I am definitely signing up for Home Eco. next year."

Fang laughed. "Ditto."

Then he leaned in and kissed me, and for the first time in a couple weeks, maybe even months—I really, truly felt at peace with myself.

Or, at least I did for about two minutes, until Angel ran out of her closet, saying: "Let's play the pink box game!"

**The End.**

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><p><strong>Edited: 12.19.2012 Posted: 12.22.2012<strong>

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><p><strong>AN: <strong>

**And so concludes the PF edit mission. Hurray! I hope you liked the new version of the story :)**

**Final word count—49, 777 words (without ANs or Disclaimers or Claimers). That's 140 pages on Word, font Calibri 12 (14 for chapter titles), including title page and table of contents page.**

**Original, before-edits word count: 38, 355 words (without ANs or Disclaimers or Claimers). That's 150 pages on Word, fond Calibri 12 (14 for chapter titles). No title page nor table of contents page. (The difference in page count is because I used to be very, very fond of my Enter key, as some of my readers may remember).**

**Thank-you for the patience, for the continued support, and I hope you enjoyed the edited version of this story. Please check out my Ch.14 AN as a final goodbye to this story, which I now officially deem complete.**

**-DemiSpy.**


	11. Plagiarism

Hi everyone!

Some of you might have seen that the Maximum Ride fb page posted a link to this fic, except not this one. I was plagiarized, unfortunately, well over a year ago. The plagiarized link was on figment .com, and I'm going to be nice and not mention the plagiarizer's name.

I reported this to figment a couple hours back, and people are commenting on facebook that the link doesn't work anymore, so I think that's that. I haven't heard back from figment, though, but I'll keep you all updated.

The plagiarized story was actually the pre-2012-edits story, by the way, meaning that it was posted a very long time ago, and I hadn't noticed. Guys, plagiarism is a big deal. It took me a while to figure this out, but I did, and I am eternally grateful to the fb MR page for that.

The point of this message: I want to leave something clear. This story is mine. It's my property because I thought it up, I wrote it down, I edited it. I read and answered the reviews, I re-read the story and cringed and decided to edit. I have a billion MS Word documents stored on my laptop to prove all this.

So to plagiarizers: you have a mind, meaning you have an imagination, and I assure you that human imagination is one of the more brilliant things this world offers. Use it! Yours might be loads better than mine, or any other author's. Write your own stories and feel proud of yourselves for it. It took me a year to notice, but I noticed. So will everyone else. Don't plagiarize.

To my readers: I want to thank you all for the loyalty you've shown over the years. People still favorite and still review. A couple of you also noticed the plagiarism fiasco and brought it up to me. Thank-you for everything, guys. This story is old, and pretty bad in some ways, but I love it because it helped me grow and it introduced me to you. To me, that's pretty frickin awesome.

I might take this AN of sorts down in a few days, or maybe I'll add some sort of story content here so that FF won't take it down.

See ya!

-DemiSpy.

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><p><strong>Update<strong>:

Hi everyone! Just wanted to let you all know that the coast is clear (I think) and that the plagiarized story has been removed. Kudos to the people at Figment - very professional. Also, the MR page posted an amendment and a formal apology earlier this week, so that's a plus, and I'm just glad this is all over.

Thanks again for the continued support! I know it seems I'm not around much lately (which I'm not - school!) but I'm still alive, and I might someday decide to return to the MR fandom. But if I do, I assure you it won't be till winter break. Or next summer. You get the point.

Happy reading, everyone! Do your homework! (At least some of it... :P)

-DemiSpy.


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